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The Lady of Cawnpore 


A ROMANCE 


FRANK VINCENT 

it 

AND 

ALBERT EDMUND LANCASTER 

1 ' 



FUNK & WAGNALLS 
NEW YORK 

LONDON 1891 TORONTO 

Printed in the United States All rights reserved 



-fi-V 


Copyright, 1891, 

BY 

FUNK & WAGNALLS. 

[.Registered at Stationers' Hall , London , England .] 


l 


w 




CONTENTS. 


PAGK 

Prologue. g 

CHAPTER I. 

Mrs. Mincer’s Boarding-House. 39 

CHAPTER II. 

The Reverend Marmaduke Allan. 53 

CHAPTER III. 

Love and Religion. 65 

. 

CHAPTER IV. 

Dr. Billington visits Marmaduke. 70 

CHAPTER V. 

Marmaduke visits Dr. Billington. 83 

CHAPTER VI. 

Marmaduke and Beatrice. 107 

CHAPTER VII. 

Mrs. Mincer and the D. B.’s. 121 

CHAPTER VIII. 

If a Man Die, Shall He Live Again ?... 135 

CHAPTER IX. 

The Sacred City. 152 

3 















4 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

CHAPTER X. 

The Fakir from Tranquebar.. 166 

CHAPTER XI. 

The Dance of the Bayaderes. 1S0 

CHAPTER XII. 

Adwe. 196 

CHAPTER XIII. 

Ecce Homo. 221 

CHAPTER XIV. 

Mother and Daughter: Father and Son. 240 

v CHAPTER XV. 

Putting the Machinery in Motion. 250 

CHAPTER XVI. 

The Red Flag. .. _ 269 

CHAPTER XVII. 

The Revenge of the Brahmins. 279 

CHAPTER XVIII. 

“Is it True?”. 285 

CHAPTER XIX. 

The Journey that was Arranged.... 299 

CHAPTER XX. 

The Journey that was Taken... 309 

CHAPTER XXI. 

“ The Dewdrop Slips into the Shining Sea”.316 

CHAPTER XXII. 

Marmaduke takes a Drive. 322 















CONTENTS. 


5 


PAGE 

CHAPTER XXIII. 

The Unseen Hand. 331 

CHAPTER XXIV. 

As a Dream When One Awaketh. 348 

CHAPTER XXV. 

“ Divyavapour Gatwa’.359 

CHAPTER XXVI. 

Hopes and Fears. 374 

CHAPTER XXVII. 

A Knock at the Door. 384 

CHAPTER XXVIII. 

A Ring at the Bell... 391 

CHAPTER XXIX. 

Mrs. Mincer has Company. 399 

CHAPTER XXX. 

“ Vengeance is Mine”. 410 















* 


“ If a man die , shall he live again ?" 


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THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


PROLOGUE. 

Early in the month of April, in the year 1857, a 
lady named Madam Gregory, accompanied only by 
her maid, arrived in the city of Cawnpore. The 
reader’s geographical memory will remind him that 
the town is situated upon the south bank of the 
Ganges, in the upper portion of Hindoostan, midway 
between its eastern and western limits. The lady 
was about thirty years of age, one of those blondes 
whose beauty is enhanced by the dusky grace which 
comes of dark brows and deeply shadowed lashes. 
She travelled with every appearance of wealth, and 
was possibly inspired by that innate love of excite¬ 
ment and adventure which occasionally induces a 
fully matured woman, like Madam Ida Pfeiffer, to 
leave home and family and set out alone for strange 
and distant lands. 

Madam Gregory, however, was not a traveller 
pure and simple. She had no desire to make danger¬ 
ous explorations or to have her name enrolled among 
those who have visited the savage places of the earth 
at the risk of life or limb. It was evident that she 
sought pleasure, perhaps distraction, in an environ- 

9 







10 THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 

ment full of barbaric relics, far from the mellowed 
civilization of a more western longitude. Among the 
English ladies and gentlemen, stationed at Cawnpore, 
to whom she had borne letters of introduction, it 
transpired that she was the widow of a Russian of 
noble birth, whose by no means small fortune had 
been added to her own. It also became known that 
she had visited most of the principal cities of Hin- 
doostan, and had acquired considerable knowledge 
of Hindoo and Mohammedan life. Why she should 
choose to remain at that plain and unattractive mart, 
when the Sacred City of Benares spread its immem¬ 
orial charms upon one hand, and the once imperial 
Delhi offered its voluptuous magnificence on the 
other, can be answered perhaps only by the fact that at 
that time Nana Sahib, whose name subsequently be¬ 
came infamous throughout Christendom, issued daily 
from his splendid palace at the suburb of Bithoor, 
sauntered through Cawnpore attended by a glittering 
retinue, and excited among the English residents 
piquant recollections of the superb entertainments 
he had given, and equally piquant expectations of 
those that were to come. 

It would be idle to deny that it was Nana Sahib’s 
presence at Cawnpore at that period which lent it 
life and brilliancy. His character was not yet known. 
Aside from the vices which are the almost infallible 
appanage of a Hindoo prince, the worst that could 
then be whispered against him was that his origin 
was unknown. It was given out that he was the son 
of a Poonah corn-merchant, or that, of still lower ex¬ 
traction, he was born in great poverty at a wretched 
village near Bombay. His real name was Seereek 


PROLOGUE. 


II 


Dhoondoo Punth. He was the adopted son of Bajee 
Rao, the Peishwa (or governor) of Poonah. Bajee 
Rao was the last monarch of one of those Mahratta 
dynasties which divided the sovereignty of the Cen¬ 
tral Highlands of India, and laid the entire peninsula 
under tribute. He had accumulated such enormous 
wealth that the paiernal British government had 
found it necessary to confiscate it and dethrone him. 
In return it assigned him a palace at Bithoor, situated 
on the Ganges, twelve miles northwest of Cawnpore. 
There he enjoyed his annuity of eighty-thousand 
pounds, and, surrounded by his leash of pet grey¬ 
hounds, invested with august tradition, and served 
by numerous retainers, he remained an object of rev¬ 
erence to the crowds of pilgrims, who, every full 
moon in November, thronged thither from all parts 
of India to invoke their tutelary deity; to worship 
him with flowers and frankincense on the ghauts, or 
landing-places; and to elate themselves into drunken 
frenzy, to the sound of savage music, when no > pious¬ 
ly bathing in the sacred stream. 

In the midst of this somewhat forlorn splendor 
Bajee Rao hugged a grief patent to every one famil¬ 
iar with Hindoo customs. He had no son to inherit 
his wealth, to transmit his name to posterity, and 
to perform the particularly filial duty of conducting 
his cremation. He had recourse to adoption, sanc¬ 
tioned by the Hindoo law, and his choice fell upon 
Seereek Dhoondoo Punth. Bajee died in 1851. See- 
reek instantly put in a claim for the continuance of 
the pension which the East India Co. had granted to 
Bajee. This claim was disallowed; but “the Nana” 
(as Seereek was subsequently called, and as we shall 





12 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


call him henceforth) contrived to secure the entire 
property of Bajee, which equalled in value thirty 
million dollars. He continued to live in the Bithoor 
palace, amid a gorgeous sensuality whose profundi¬ 
ties are indescribable, and from time to time gave 
entertainments attended by all English residents of 
any note, from the city twelve miles below. What 
mattered occasional eccentricities of furniture and 
appointment in the household of a prince whose in¬ 
come was enormous, even among the gigantic reve¬ 
nues of Indian landholders? What did it matter that 
on his damask tablecloth towels occasionally did duty 
for napkins; that soup was sometimes ladled out 
with a broken willow-pattern tea-cup; that bone- 
handle knives were in contrast with silver forks and 
spoons; that beer was served in tumblers of the 
cheapest description, and claret in richly-cut cham¬ 
pagne glasses ? These were the naif incongruities of 
an orientalism which had not quite assimilated the 
consistent refinements of a colder civilization. The 
Nana, in spite of his deeply seated grudge against 
the Feringhees (as the English were called), and with 
revenge slowly elaborating itself in his heart, did 
everything in his power to render himself agreeable 
to the British residents. He refreshed his intelligence 
with the Anglo-Indian journals, which were daily 
translated to him. He played billiards with the 
officers of the garrison. He provided balls, banquets, 
hunting parties and picnics. He mingled freely with 
(his guests, from the greatest to the least. He pre¬ 
sented Cashmere shawls to the ladies, and his gifts of 
sapphires and rubies sparkled on the fingers of many 
an English lad, who, partaking frankly of his hospi- 


PROLOGUE. 


*3 


tality, never suspected that the Nana "had already 
murdered him at heart. 

To many of these entertainments came Madam 
Gregory, accompanied by Sir George Barker and 
family, with whom she was then staying. She bore 
with her the tranquil air of a woman of the world, 
accustomed to magnificent hospitality in every clime, 
and a trifle weary of everything that did not promise 
some new excitement. She had preserved her youth 
and beauty with extraordinary success, looked less 
than her age, and within a month after her arrival 
had become known among people of the middle class 
as The Lady of Cawnpore—an extemporary title 
which was smiled at without satire or resentment by 
the persons of her own class among whom she moved. 
She had a distinction of manner which many women 
who would seem born to such distinction envied 
her in vain. Her smile was one of the sweetest in 
the world, but it was a smile which betrayed that be¬ 
neath her most joyous pleasure was a much darker 
pain. It was this subtle expression, united with her 
brilliant blonde beauty, that attracted the fawning 
notice of Prince Fazal, a faithful vasal of the Nana, 
and possessed of enormous wealth. His eyes lit up 
with black fire as he gloated over this dazzling Eng- 
lish-woman, who to him was the fairest vision he 
had ever e-ncountered. The tantalization was that 
she was utterly beyond his reach. She listened to 
his oriental compliments with a demure smile, or 
shrugged her shoulders with an air not wholly devoid 
of contempt. There was a certain magnetism in his 
prurient glance which made her doubly glad to 
escape it. 







14 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


Madam Gregory seemed especially framed to 
dwell amid luxury, and to perish if exposed to the 
harsher ills of life. No one could imagine her capa¬ 
ble of enduring poverty and all its woes. And yet, 
in spite of this delicacy of physique, she had travel¬ 
led far and wide, accompanied solely by her maid, a 
dwarfish Tartar girl named Olga, who carried a red 
brand upon her forehead, which spoke of former 
servitude. This girl adored her mistress, sat silent 
in her company for hours, like a familiar spirit, would 
ever have kept her in sight if possible, and at inter¬ 
vals amused herself picking up some knowledge of 
Hindoostanee. It was not the spectacle of the splendid 
Nana, panoplied in kincob and Cashmere scarfs, 
wearing a tiara of pearls and diamonds and girded 
with Bajee’s sword of state, valued at three lakhs of 
rupees, that had the slightest attraction for Madame 
Gregory. She enjoyed, as much as she could enjoy 
anything, the intimate mixture of barbarism and 
civilization found in more irregular and picturesque 
patches at Bithoor and Cawnpore than at other 
places she had visited. Beyond this, in Sir George 
Barker’s family, which consisted of his wife and one 
child, a boy of eighteen, she found a genial rest, in 
which she accrued strength for the months, perhaps 
years, of travel, which still invited her insatiable 
spirit. Sir George was grim as a gray lion, but epi¬ 
curean to a fault. His wife was one of those gentle 
English ladies whose fortunate experience has led 
them to believe that misery is a foreigner, with whom 
they have never become at home. The boy, George, 
was like hundreds of English lads who have been 
brought up in India, his bright eyes and blooming 


PROLOGUE. 


15 


cheeks already beginning to fade in that prostrating 
clime. 

Oh, well would it have been for Madam Gregory 
had she re-begun her journeys at once. Well would 
it have been had she left that fated spot at the last of 
April, at the last of May, at any time before those 
early days in June, when a horror fell upon the little 
city equal to any found in human records. But she 
did not hasten her going, and it is because she did 
not that this narrative finds place. 

The remote causes of the Sepoy mutiny of 1857 are 
involved in some obscurity. The natives alleged that 
it was due to the impoverishment of the country, 
the severity of the taxation laid upon them by the 
British government, and the suspected design of that 
government to convert them to Christianity. Another 
alleged cause was Mohammedan fanaticism. Through 
the English elevation of the Hindoos, the Moham¬ 
medans lost the supremacy they had hitherto enjoyed 
in law, religion, and language, and had ceased to 
have a monopoly in government employment. How¬ 
ever this may be, the direct cause of the outbreak 
was the introduction of the English rifle, with its 
greased cartridge, which, in using, the native soldiers 
were required to bite. As to eat pig defiles a Mussul¬ 
man, and to eat cow is sacrilege to a Hindoo, and as 
elements of both these substances were supposed to 
be represented in the greased cartridge, the excuse 
for mutiny was presented in a form there was no 
temptation to resist. Previous to this, however, 
cakes of salt and dough, called chupatties, were fur¬ 
tively distributed by the natives throughout every 
village and hamlet—mysterious intimation that some 





l6 THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 

evil was at hand, and that everybody would do 
well to keep himself prepared. It was whispered 
throughout the northwest provinces that the extinct 
Mogul dynasty was to wake to a glorious resurrection 
after a century’s sleep, and that the English were to 
be torn up, root and branch, from the land where 
they had so insolently planted themselves. 

After the secret distribution of the chupatties, the 
first inutterings of the storm were indicated in trea¬ 
sonable placards put up at Delhi. Then came the 
trouble about the English rifles and the greased car¬ 
tridges. At last, on April 23d, 1857, the Third Native 
Cavalry, at Agra, refused to touch them. Eighty-five 
of the mutineers were at once laden with fetters and 
sent to jail. Seventeen days afterward they were re¬ 
leased by their comrades. Delhi was taken by the 
insurgents on May nth,and the demonism of the re¬ 
volt began. 

All this time the Nana continued his entertainments 
at Bithoor and Cawnpore, bringing to bear upon them 
whatever social talent his thirty-six years enabled 
him to display I* was not until the early days of 
May that the English residents began to understand 
what had occurred elsewhere, and to entertain vague 
fear as to what disaster might possibly happen to 
themselves. Guns had been heard at a distance all 
the night of May xoth, and these produced a certain 
alarm among those who had dwelt long enough in 
India to know that falsehood and treachery were the 
besetting sins of the Hindoo. No alarm, however, 
visited Madam Gregory, who was exhausting the 
charm of dolce far niente at Sir George Barker’s beau¬ 
tiful villa, a long distance from the town. The little 


PROLOGUE. 


17 


family had become orientalized to a singular degree, 
mingling much that was luxuriously enervating in 
Eastern customs with some of the imperative con¬ 
ventionalities of European life. Sometimes, reclining 
upon mats of bamboo, sometimes seated upon capa¬ 
cious fauteuils, the three members of the family and 
their guest indulged in the national hookah, and 
drank the odorous coffee that comes from Neilgherry. 
Sometimes Sir George and his son smoked those 
delicious cigars imported from Trichinopoly and 
Rangoon, the boy meanwhile rolling tiny cigarettes 
for Madam Gregory—cigarettes made from the 
perfumed tobacco that hails from Coringa. Some¬ 
times in the full Indian moonlight—that bold yet 
delicate moonlight which makes everything look like 
frost-work and fern-leaf transmuted into silver— 
a small troop of laden elephants would pass slowly 
by, like a phantasmal vision, their drivers calling 
them “Fairy Rose,” “Blossom of the Forest,” and 
such other pet names as the natives apply to these 
uncouth monsters. Occasionally a line of camels, ugly, 
vicious, and stupid when near, graceful and undulat¬ 
ing at a distance, was dimly discerned among the 
shadows of the remote mango-hills, their sinuous and 
soundless motion throwing upon the landscape an 
effect both ghostly and grotesque. Native servants 
stood in the rear of the little household, creating an 
artificial breeze with large chamurs—silver-handled 
fans made of the tails of Thibetan cows—and joining 
their voices sympathetically with that of the bullock- 
driver as he shouted, “Go on, thou bullock of my heart. 
Go on, thou mother-in-law’s darling.” The voices of 
devotees stole up from the river-bank, as, bathing in 



l8 THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 

the yellow flood, they united in their invocation, 
“ Glory to the Ganges, the holy Ganges.” These 
were hours for softest and most fantastic dreaming. 
Madam Gregory, cherishing a half-mirthful compas¬ 
sion for the adoration she had, at first unconsciously, 
kindled in the English boy’s heart, submitted herself 
to the lazy influences of this unreal peace, and almost 
fancied herself living in the time of that Noor Jehan 
(“ Light of the World ”) who, daughter of an Afghan 
chief, and wife of the great Jehanghir, invented the 
languid hookah and discovered the priceless attar 
where the rose swooned in its own sweetness. Before 
retiring to the siesta, which lasts from noon until four 
o’clock, and which, in her host’s house, was enjoyed 
in marble chambers, where the ever-waving punkah 
maintained a constant zephyr, she took a long look 
at the rain-bowed cockatoos flashing amid the mango 
orchards or brilliantly reposing in the Forest of the 
Wild Dove, as the adjacent wood was called. A 
yearning look crept into her sad eyes at such moments, 
and then Olga, who was forever on the watch, would 
steal up to her and whisper in her ears a few caress¬ 
ful words in Russian, and madam, starting from the 
deep reverie into which she had been thrown, would 
suffer herself to be led into a shaded inner chamber 
where that sleep awaited her which is the best nepen¬ 
the humanity can know. And so the soft-footed days 
stole on, lulling each and all into indolent content, 
with pleasures languorous as the lotus floating upon 
Lethe, intoxicating them into a magic daze, as en¬ 
tirely as though they had deeply drunk of that juice 
of the plant which anciently was offered to the gods. 

Meanwhile, in Cawnpore proper, consternation was 


PROLOGUE. 


19 


created by the non-arrival from the northwest of 
European travellers who had been confidently ex¬ 
pected. It was secretly reported that the native 
garrison at Delhi had butchered all the English on 
whom they could lay hands. The officer then in 
command of the troops at Cawnpore was Major- 
General Sir Hugh Wheeler. He was seventy-five 
years old, was a firm believer in the friendship and 
good faith of the Nana, and, as the sequel proved, 
had become totally unfit for the responsible position 
he occupied. A sepoy belonging to the 56th regi¬ 
ment spread reports, both in that regiment and in 
the cavalry lines, that on the fifth of the coming 
June the native troops were to be deprived of their 
arms, assembled under pretence of being paid, and 
then blown from a mine constructed by the European 
officers. This created an insurrectionary panic, and 
the sepoy was put in irons, Sir Hugh telegraphing 
to Sir Henry Lawrence, at Lucknow, for aid. But 
in the silliness of his credulity he also invoked, from 
another quarter, help which wrought far worse dis¬ 
aster than Sir Henry’s assistance could make good. 
Relying implicitly upon the loyalty of the Nana, he 
applied to that skilled dissembler, who, in response, 
sent to him from Bithoor two guns and three hundred 
men, cavalry and infantry. This gave to the Nana 
a glorious opportunity which he could not have ex¬ 
pected. Arrived at Cawnpore, he changed the ami¬ 
able and hospitable attitude he had worn so long. 
He and his soldiers took up their quarters among 
the houses occupied by the English and their families. 
He placed the Treasury, which contained more than 
a hundred thousand pounds sterling, in the custody 





20 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


of his own booty-guard, and, becoming master of the 
situation at a single stroke, proposed that the ladies 
and children in Cawnpore should be placed for pro¬ 
tection in his Bithoor palace. 

But the notoriety of that palace had gone abroad. 
In certain pictured rooms, sealed from the common 
eye, and blasting to any unpolluted glance which 
rested on them, debauches had been protracted which 
the ink blushes to describe. Sir Hugh at last per¬ 
ceived his immense mistake, but was too dull to 
rectify it. Instead of instantly seizing upon the fort 
known as the Magazine, which was splendidly adapt¬ 
ed for defence, he stupidly ordered a mud wall, four 
feet high, to be thrown up round the buildings which 
composed the old Dragoon Hospital. Ten guns were 
placed round this intrenchment, a supply of very 
poor provisions was laid in for twenty-five days, and 
inside this contracted space all the English residents 
of Cawnpore hurried—all excepting Sir George 
Barker’s family and their guest, who, hearing little, 
and fearing less, continued their life of quiet enchant¬ 
ment. The Nana was now in intimate communication 
with the ringleaders of the native regiment in which 
the panic had taken place, and put himself at their 
disposal, though he endeavored to conceal his inten¬ 
tions from the English by frequent visits to Bithoor. 
Sir Hugh had sent back to Sir Henry Lawrence, at 
Lucknow, the reinforcement he had received thence, 
and had even increased it by a detachment of his 
own, which he could ill spare. 

It was on the night of the 5th of June that sud 
denly three reports of a pistol and a sudden and 
furious conflagration gave token that the revolt had 



PROLOGUE. 


21 


broken out in full force. The First Native Infantry 
joined with the Second Cavalry, and made for the 
Treasury and the Magazine. At this crisis Sir Hugh 
Wheeler, injudicious as ever, ordered the guns of the 
intrenchment to fire upon the wavering natives of 
the 53d regiment. Amazed at this treatment, they 
broke and fled, and transferred their allegiance to 
the Nana. The Treasury was broken open, and its 
contents were distributed among the insurgents. The 
jail was unlocked and some of the greatest scoun¬ 
drels upon earth were let loose to work every infamy 
in their power. The Magistrate’s office and the 
Court House were fired. European dwellings at the 
west end were sacked and burned. The cables were 
cut which made fast the bridge of boats across the 
Ganges. Those of the English who had prepared 
for instant flight, under the impression that the mu¬ 
tineers were on their way to Delhi, where great atroc¬ 
ities had prevailed, now found escape impossible. 
At dawn on June 6th, the Nana, whose infernal char¬ 
acter stood at last almost fully revealed, sent to Sir 
Hugh a letter in which he announced his intention 
of immediately beginning an attack on the intrench¬ 
ment, which the English soldiers, numbering not 
more than four hundred, were hardly, as yet, pre¬ 
pared to defend, and which had become the agonizing 
home of the entire English colon)', including nearly 
three hundred women—many of them ladies most 
delicately nurtured—and an equal number of children. 

One evening—it was the evening of the 5th of 
June—the little household at the suburban villa were 
enjoying themselves, though not quite in their usual 
manner. Lady Barker had given all the servants 


22 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


leave to be absent until midnight, in order to at¬ 
tend an entertainment by some fakirs at the adjacent 
village. Not a soul was in the house besides them¬ 
selves, excepting, indeed, Olga, who was never absent. 
Outside, a silence reigned that would have been 
lugubrious, oppressive, and foreboding, had not Mad¬ 
am Gregory, who was a skillful musician, relieved 
it by singing, with piano accompaniment, some of 
those old-fashioned songs, which one never hears 
to-day. She had just concluded the last lines of 
“ Arranmore: ” 

“Ah, dream too full of saddening truth ! 

Those mansions o’er the main 
Are like the hopes I built in youth, 

As sunny and as vain !” 

Her voice was lingering upon the last sound, when 
Olga rushed into the room, and shrieked out in Rus¬ 
sian some sentences which made Madam Gregory 
leap from her seat and turn very white. 

“We must escape at once,” she explained hurriedly 
to the startled family. “ The fakirs were a pretence. 
The servants have left the house in order to betray 
us to some mutineers. While we have been dreaming 
here, all Cawnpore is in an uproar. And yet that is 
the only place where we can possibly be safe.” 

The others had arisen and surrounded her in the 
utmost dismay. Scarcely had she finished, when the 
clatter of hoofs was heard. All rushed into the gar¬ 
den, lit only by the moon, impelled by a common in¬ 
stinct that told them that whatever risk awaited them, 
their chance was better in the open air than in that 
beautiful villa, packed with so much that would be 


PROLOGUE. 


2 3 


rare prize for pillagers. The only one who nad per¬ 
fect presence of mind was Olga, who in her flight 
snatched from a cupboard, in the adjoining room, a 
loaded pistol which Sir George always kept there. 
As they reached the gates of the garden, which 
opened upon the highway, fleeing, they knew not 
whither, three native horsemen, who were, indeed, 
part of the demoralized Second Cavalry, came gal¬ 
loping up, aflame with liquor, and elated with the 
carnage and pillage upon which they had exercised 
their savagery during the day. Then ensued a scene, 
which, at that time, was reduplicating itself in many 
an English household all over the northern part of 
India. A shot perforated the air, and Lady Barker 
fell to the ground, her heart pierced with a bullet, 
her death too instantaneous for her to feel its bitter¬ 
ness. But even as she fell, another shot, equally 
well aimed, came from a hand that no one recognized 
in the confusion, and one of the sepoys reeled in his 
saddle and fell headlong to the ground, his feet es¬ 
caping the entanglement of his stirrups. The freed 
horse, which plunged and reared, was seized by its 
bridle by a well-trained hand, whose owner, placing 
her foot, with fiery contempt, upon the body of the 
dead sepoy, mounted like an athlete into his vacant 
seat, and with one powerful arm pulled up in front 
of her a white-clad figure, which, in the horror of the 
moment, was more like a shadowy wraith than mortal 
woman. Olga, touching the rein with the skill of a 
Tartar maid who had mastered untamed steeds in 
childhood, sped away with her burden, unheeding 
the whiz of the bullets flying after her, giving no 
thought to the tragedy about to complete itself in 


24 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


the little paradise she left behind, only eager to save 
the mistress she adored. The latter, with a courage 
equal to her maid’s, retained an unfainting conscious¬ 
ness of all that had happened, and pondered the pos¬ 
sibility of escape as they fled through the night, the 
burning constellations of the Indian sky shining 
down upon them as though no such thing as suffer¬ 
ing existed beneath their beams. 

The sepoys from whom they had escaped had 
their hands too full to pursue. Sir George Barker 
and his son ran into the house to procure the weapons 
with which they failed to arm themselves in the be¬ 
ginning. The sepoys instantly dismounted and fol¬ 
lowed. There could be no equality in such a combat. 
Before the two Englishmen could reach the little 
room which stood for armory, their pursuers were 
upon them. As Sir George turned round with the 
desperate courage of a man brought to bay, a bullet 
entered his brain, and throwing up his arms he fell 
face downward upon the marble floor, motionless 
forever. The two murderers then turned upon the 
English lad, meet sacrifice for their unglutted sabres. 
They cut him down as he stood there defenceless, 
and he sank, a mass of wounds, which let out his 
blood in lavish streams. Then, joined by others of 
their stamp, and the returned servants of the house¬ 
hold, the entire band sacked the house from roof to 
basement, laded themselves with all the portable 
spoil, drank the rich vintages found in the cellars, 
and finally, as morning dawned, and the debauch was 
over, set fire to the beautiful villa, and mounting 
their steeds, left the treacherous servants to wander 
where they would, and galloped furiously in the di- 


PROLOGUE. 25 

rection of Cawnpore, leaving behind them a towering 
cone of flame. 

Just before the dawn of that same morning a horse, 
flecked with foam, bearing upon its weary back two 
women, joined the frightened caravan of soldiers, 
civilians, ladies and children, who, huddled together 
in wildest disorder, were entering the sorry intrench- 
ment. Most of them were doomed never to leave it 
alive. Some were to be shattered by bursting shells. 
Others were to be killed outright by the ever-whizzing 
bullet. Others, again, were fated to grope their way 
to the grave through labyrinths of starvation and 
madness. There were women who were to give birth 
to children, while bombs exploded in the air above 
them. There were other women who were to know 
the agony of hearing the ceaseless moans of their 
little ones, dying for lack of a drop of water which 
could be procured without risking a needed life. 
There were soldiers in the bloom of boyhood destined 
to fade slowly into skeletons as they stood by their 
too-exposed guns, unless a bullet sent them to a hasty 
sepulture of which future history would forget to 
make honorable mention. All that was noble, heroic, 
beautiful, and pitiable, was crowded into that con¬ 
course of a thousand, hurrying helter-skelter from 
the impending vengeance of Nana Sahib. As the 
horse bearing the two women entered the intrench- 
ment, it stood still as though conscious that it had 
conducted its riders to a place of at least temporary 
safety. No one noticed that she who first dismounted, 
her garments torn, her hair loose and floating, her 
face white, her eyes wide and staring, was the beauti¬ 
ful Lady of Cawnpore. No one observed that the 





2 6 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


other woman, as she too dismounted, supporting 
Madam Gregory with one arm, and leading the tired 
steed with the other, was the Tartar maid, who had 
saved her mistress by a few overheard words among 
Sir George Barker’s servants—words which her 
sparse knowledge of Hindoostanee enabled her to 
understand. The sad multitude had little disposition, 
at that moment, for any glance or comment that did 
not comport with individual safety. They entered 
the intrenchment, from which all exit was now closed; 
and then began three weeks of horror such as the 
historian cannot chronicle without a shudder, or the 
optimist contemplate without feeling his creed grow 
weak at heart. 

As we are not writing the history of the siege of 
Cawnpore, but merely indicating a few incidents in it 
that are connected with our present narrative, we 
shall, happily, make no attempt to describe the hero¬ 
ism and the agony which were depicted by skillful 
pens at the time, and which have often been portrayed 
by the conscientious annalist since. Suffice it to say 
that at noon on Sunday, June 7th, the regular siege 
of the intrenchment began by a raking fire of twenty- 
four pound shot from every quarter of the compass. 
The fatuity of having selected such a spot, and 
thrown up so shabby a fortification, vulnerable at 
every point, became at once apparent. In this con¬ 
centrated fire of a thousand muskets and a score of 
cannon, the women and children within the inclosure, 
as well as the soldiers, were exposed for twenty days, 
with little that could strictly be called shelter. At 
first shrieks went up with every shot, followed by low 
wailing; but presently suffering was subdued into 


PROLOGUE. 


27 


silence. Before three days had passed, every door 
and window was battered in. Soon after, all the 
walls and partitions shared the same fate, and ball 
and shell worked their will through the dismantled 
rooms. Many of the ladies were instantly killed by 
round-shot or grape. Many were mangled by the 
displaced brickwork, or by hugh splinters sent flying 
from door and window-sash. The entire destruction 
of one of the buildings compelled two hundred of the 
women to spend twelve days and nights on the bare 
ground, half the time beneath a blazing sun, and all 
the time amid poisonous exhalations and the likeli¬ 
hood of death in many a painful form. They were 
reduced to rags and squalor, with naked feet and 
hair uncombed, despair at their hearts and famine at 
their vitals. They, as all the rest, were visited with 
fever, apoplexy, and cholera. The medical stores 
had all been destroyed in one of the conflagrations, 
and no drugs, cordials, or anodynes could be ob¬ 
tained. Sometimes a man would become drowsy, 
and then, sinking into insensibility, close his eyes for¬ 
ever. One old lady, struck down by a musket bullet, 
suffered intensely from the wound. Her son lost his 
reason and died raving mad. The small stock of 
provisions failed. Water could be obtained only from 
the fatally exposed well. Moreover, the rainy season 
was at hand, and in a few days an unceasing deluge 
would add to present woes others more intolerable. 

It was at this stage, that Nana Sahib, his troops 
damagingly repulsed, saw that, since he could not 
conquer the garrison without so protracting the siege 
as to make his own position dangerous among his 
discontented sepoys, he might accomplish by treachery 



28 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


what ne could not achieve by any legitimate resource. 
He sent a female envoy, named Mrs. Jacobi, an Eng¬ 
lishwoman whom he had taken prisoner, offering all 
who would lay down their arms safe conduct to Al¬ 
lahabad. The offer, after a little negotiation, was ac¬ 
cepted by Sir Hugh Wheeler, and, on the 27th of 
June, the handful that remained of the thousand 
souls who had sought refuge in the intrenchment, 
gathered themselves together and sallied forth pre¬ 
pared to embark on the vessels that had been pro¬ 
vided. The sequel has become notorious among the 
infamies of the world. As the little company, among 
them the wounded and the dying, reached the land¬ 
ing-place, and began to embark, the sudden blast of 
a bugle was heard coming from a dark ravine which 
they had just traversed, and a storm of grape and 
musketry broke upon them from the ambushed 
sepoys. The entire fleet in which the English had 
hoped to sail to Allahabad, burst into flames, by 
means of red-hot charcoal previously prepared. 
Many of those who had already boarded the vessels 
perished in the fire; others fell into the water and 
were drowned. Caught in this trap, the Englishmen 
who had rifles at hand fired them at the treacherous 
scoundrels by whom they were surrounded. A 
courier at that instant arrived from the Nana with 
an order to kill all the males, but keep the women 
alive; and this was almost literally done, with the 
exception of a few men, who, amid appalling suffer¬ 
ings, contrived to escape. Finally a hundred and 
twenty-five women and children were collected (all 
that remained out of the six hundred that had entered 
the intrenchment), and surrounded by a crowd of 


PROLOGUE. 


29 


jeering sepoys, were conducted, covered with mud 
and blood, along such a via dolorosa as few have ever 
trod. They passed the ruined intrenchment where 
everything dear to them was lost forever. They 
"halted before the pavilion of the Nana, who reviewed 
them and then ordered them to be confined in a 
building known as the Savada House, close by, in the 
extreme southern portion of the city. Thence, on 
the first day of July, they were removed to a small 
building at the opposite extremity of the town, north 
of the Ganges canal and near the Ganges river. 
This house has since been known in India as the Bee- 
beegur, or House of the Ladies; in England as the 
House of the Massacre. It contained two rooms, each 
twenty feet by ten; some smaller rooms, or rather 
closets, without windows, intended for native ser¬ 
vants; and an open court about twenty-five feet square. 
Here the list of captives was swollen so as to number 
about eighty more. There were two hundred and six 
Europeans altogether, most of them ladies and chil¬ 
dren of gentle birth. Only five men—men who 
were gentlemen—were included in this mournful 
array. The bamboo matting was their only couch. 
Lentil porridge and cakes of unleavened dough were 
their only food, unaccompanied by plate or spoon. 
Occasionally there was a little bread and milk. The 
matron was a tall woman of fair complexion, thirty 
years old, with a few gray hairs. She was known as 
“the Begum,” and had been waiting-maid to Adala, 
the favorite courtesan of the Nana. 

Less than a hundred yards from this pest-hole 
stood a large house owned by a Mohammedan, and 
painted bright yellow. The Nana selected it for his 


3 ° 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


headquarters, and reserved two large centre rooms 
for his public receptions. One of the wings was 
occupied by his priests and minions. Here the 
dusky beauty, Adala, whose wealth is said to have 
been counted by hundreds of thousands of rupees, 
reigned queen; and here, every night, music, dancing, 
and pantomime announced that the Nana was enjoy¬ 
ing the pleasure of his power, ere sinking into the 
mysterious sensualities that came with midnight. 
These barbaric melodies were plainly heard by the 
dying captives in the House of the Ladies. Throng¬ 
ing at the windows to catch the twilight breeze, 
those savage strains reminded them of the hours, 
only a few short weeks ago, when the wretch who 
had brought this appalling misery upon them was 
honored if they visited his palace, and had bent low 
before them as a courtier might bend before a queen. 

And Madam Gregory—what of her? Years after¬ 
ward it transpired, from the only lips that lived to 
tell the story, that through long hours, day after 
day, an English woman, beautiful still, with dis¬ 
hevelled hair and garments almost dropping from her 
emaciated form, was seen standing in one of the 
stables of the Nana, grinding corn at a hand-mill. It 
was the custom for the Begum to conduct this wo¬ 
man thither, daily, for that purpose. She toiled on, 
though the perspiration fell from her brow and her 
limbs trembled. She did not know that often a pair 
of fiery eyes, those of Prince Fazal, watched her 
gloatingly from behind a shaded window in the ad¬ 
jacent house. She ground the corn with desperate 
industry, until suddenly one day, her outraged 
strength gave way, and she fell, in a long deep swoon. 


PROLOGUE. 


3 * 


Yet even thus, lying there, like dust-stained alabaster, 
she remained beautiful in that temporary death—all 
that was left of Madam Gregory ! 

It was at this juncture that Havelock, having ar¬ 
rived in India, moved northward from Allahabad, with 
six cannon and a thousand English soldiers, bent upon 
inflicting vengeance for all the agonies and infamies 
the murdered garrison at Cawnpore had endured. It 
was at this juncture, too, that the sepoys in the pay 
of the Nana began to be discontented with their 
master, partly because of the meagreness of the do¬ 
nations distributed among them, and partly because 
his debauched and effeminate life rendered him in¬ 
capable of securing their esteem. As news of Have¬ 
lock’s approach was confirmed, the Nana became the 
victim of an immense terror. He felt that retribution 
of the direst description was about to overtake him, 
and his chief adviser, a man named Teeka Singh, 
whispered shudderingly in his ear, “What was he 
going to do with the prisoners ?” The minion hinted 
that it would be best to put them out of the way, so 
that none be left alive to tell the advancing host the 
hideous story of the snare laid for the gallant soldiers 
and delicate ladies to whom safety had been treach¬ 
erously promised. This advice prevailed over the 
importunities of the royal ladies, the widows of Bajee 
Rao (the Nana’s father, by adoption), who sent him 
word that they would throw their children and them¬ 
selves from the windows of the palace, if he murdered 
any of the English women. The Nana took counsel 
with his intimates, and the result was that, though 
the royal widows, as a pledge of the sincerity of their 
intentions, had already abstained from food and drink 


32 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


for many hours, several of his underlings repaired to 
the House of the Ladies, and brought forth the few 
men who were confined there, and two boys. These 
emaciated beings, who had drained the last dregs of 
wretchedness, were stopped at the gate that led into 
the roadway, and there, in the presence of a large 
throng of Hindoos and Mohammedans, were shot 
dead—the Nana himself, surrounded by his favorite 
courtiers, enjoying the spectacle from beneath a lime- 
tree, where the gold lace of his rich turban sparkled 
in the sun. The rest of the awful programme had 
been perfectly arranged. About an hour after, the 
Begum, who had left the House of the Ladies for a 
few moments and sought an interview with the Nana, 
returned to it in company with five men, each of 
whom carried a sabre. Two were Hindoo peasants; 
two were butchers by trade, and Mohammedans. 
The fifth, who was likewise a Mohammedan, wore 
the red uniform of the Nana’s bodyguard, and is said 
to have been the lover of the virago who had con¬ 
ducted the assassins to their work. 

The sepoys who constituted the guard outside were 
commanded by this officer, whose name was Survur 
Khan, to fall on. But they had meanwhile taken 
counsel among themselves, and sworn never to lift a 
hand against the English ladies, their motive being 
to stand well with Havelock when he should arrive. 
Consequently, they merely advanced and discharged 
their muskets through one of the windows of the 
house, aiming at the ceiling,—and the five assassins 
entered alone. 

It was the twilight hour, when the blaze of the hot 
Indian sky fades into the tender gloaming, like a 


PROLOGUE. 


33 


multitude of jewels melting in a purple cup; when 
peace falls upon the tired earth, and stars prepare to 
sparkle in the lonely sky. The door closed behind 
the murderers, and for a moment all was still. Then, 
suddenly, the air was penetrated with shrieks and 
g~oans, and ere long a stream of blood made its way 
across the lintel and trickled in a sluggish course. 
Survur Khan came out, closing the door, his face de¬ 
moniac with the enthusiasm of murder, not yet com¬ 
plete, his hair-covered hands holding a sword, which 
had done its work so thoroughly as to be broken at 
the hilt. He crossed to the Nana’s abode, procured 
another, and again entered the house, which was now 
deep in blood, and where the shrill shrieks had sub¬ 
sided to low wails. Presently he came forth again, 
the fresh sword broken as the first had been. Per¬ 
haps it, too, had refused to do the work required of it. 
Again he crossed to the Nana’s quarters, and with a 
third sword, perchance of better temper, entered the 
house for the last time. As he did so a close carriage, 
to which a pair of splendid steeds were attached, drew 
up at a little distance. Two armed natives got out, 
and stood by the open door of the carriage, as though 
in anxious waiting. 

This time Survur Khan arrived almost too late, for 
the task was nearly done. The floor was piled thick 
with dead and dying women, and every cry that 
human agony can utter arose in a chorus as mourn¬ 
ful as any ever heard on earth. Darkness was closing 
in, and over that darkness there seemed to stretch a 
crimson film. The four men who had almost com¬ 
pleted their labor in his absence, were busy prodding 
still panting breasts with reeking sabres. At the far 


34 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


end of the room were two women clinging together. 
One was fair, the other dark. Survur Khan advanced 
toward them. 

At a signal from him three of the men now left the 
chamber, from whose red-pooled floor arose that 
horrible bouquet that weighs sickeningly upon the air 
when blood has flowed instead of wine. The remain¬ 
ing man, at another signal, strode toward the fair 
woman, drooping like a lily with ensanguined stalk, 
and seized her roughly by the arm. She uttered no 
cry, but shrank from that polluting touch, to which 
a leprous grasp would have been clean. The dark 
woman sprang, or tried to spring, toward her mistress. 
In doing so her back was turned for an instant to 
Survur Khan, who, with one blow from his sharp, 
strong sword, clove her from the head down, so that 
the body fell apart like the separating halves of a 
bisected phantom. For a second the body of the 
faithful Tartar maid seemed to reel, and her eyes to 
cast one glance at her mistress, as though to ask 
what fate awaited her. Then it fell in a heap, fit 
companion, at last, for the others lying there. 

“ And this woman ?” asked the man, whose clutch 
was leaving its print upon the lady’s arm. 

Survur Khan muttered something in reply, in which 
all that the lady could distinguish was the single 
word, “ Bithoor.” The door was opened and she was 
partly carried, partly dragged, across the hecatomb, 
and shoved into the carriage that stood waiting. 
The two natives who had emerged from it, entered 
with her, and were rapidly driven off over a road she 
had traversed in pleasure parties too often not to 
know whither she was now going. As the carriage 


PROLOGUE. 


35 


disappeared in the shadows of the first pale moon¬ 
light, Survur Khan and his followers, with many a 
deep breath, crossed over to the quarters of the Nana, 
to report that all was well. 

To explain the mental condition of Madam Greg¬ 
ory is a task we shall not attempt, further than to 
say that, seeing no present means of death, an insen¬ 
sibility stole over her which is sometimes the precursor 
of madness. Yet her mind was so well-balanced that 
perhaps nothing that could have happened would 
have given her that relief. As they rode on, with 
never-slackening speed, the name Bithoor repeated 
itself incessantly in her ears, and all she had ever 
heard about its notorious and splendid palace mingled 
with recollections of the frightful carnage through 
which she was the only one who had passed alive. 
She remembered that that palace was the home of 
every crime, the asylum of atrocious pleasures. 
There the loveliest bayaderes in India were wont to 
dance in privacy before the Nana, until, exhausted by 
deep draughts of ginger, cantharides, and hemp, and 
dizzy with frantic whirls, they fell fainting at his feet. 
There, in the subterranean dungeons, that fatal bev¬ 
erage, named poust, had been revived from its cen¬ 
turies of disuse, and, compounded of hemp and night¬ 
shade, had been forced upon captives, destroying 
their brains with its potent poison, and reducing them 
to idiocy. The palace’s turrets of white marble were 
relieved by borders of flowers, executed in colored 
mosaics, composed of agate, cornelian, lapis lazuli, 
blood-stone and other semi-precious gems. In a 
pavilion of green marble, which she had once entered 
at the Nana’s request, soon after her arrival at Cawn- 


36 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


pore, were golden vines hung with grapes of emerald 
and ruby. There she had sat and chatted with the 
potentate, Prince Fazal standing by, offering his 
homage. Once, both had accompanied her to a crys¬ 
tal grotto, reached by many a winding and descend¬ 
ing stair cut in the solid wall. The plash of soft 
water came from an azure lakelet that opened like a 
liquid mirror, while raised torches, shedding a golden 
light, scattered a thousand opalescent hues. One red 
flower, growing from a crevice in the white wall, 
gleamed, out of reach, like a menace, as though re¬ 
vealing, against its will, the treachery hidden beneath 
all this pomp. There Prince Fazal had whispered to 
her, as she turned disdainfully away, that she was as 
beautiful as the full moon, that her teeth were like 
the seeds of the pomegranate, and her voice sweet as 
the cuckoo’s—highest compliment that a Hindoo 
could pay. Then she remembered the wonderful ter¬ 
race, tesselated with black and white marble, always 
cool, shaded, and fragrant, upon which the Nana was 
accustomed to play his sensuous game of chess, the 
pieces being the loveliest houris of the harem, oppo- 
singly attired in green and white. All these, and a 
hundred other recollections, wandered through her 
tired brain, mingling themselves confusedly with a 
massacre in the House of the Ladies, and forming a 
composite panorama, in which every scene of luxury 
and pleasure became crimsoned with slaughter and 
horrible with shrieks. 

Suddenly the carriage stopped. She was lifted 
out, a dying woman rather than a living one, with 
just enough consciousness left to perceive that they 
had entered the courtyard of the palace. Here her 


PROLOCUE. 


37 


attendants left her, and handed her to others, and 
the carriage rolled away. Still, with death impos¬ 
sible, and knowing the uselessness of struggle, she 
was conducted to one of the upper chambers, where 
a group of skilful tire-women took her, not unkindly, 
in charge. She was bathed luxuriously, anointed 
and perfumed. Her fine, abundant hair, cleansed 
and combed, was dressed in a manner that well be¬ 
came the remnants of her beauty—a beauty which 
it would take weeks of tender nursing to perfectly 
restore. Her ragged blood-stained garments were 
exchanged for Indian attire, such raiment as a prin¬ 
cess might complacently have worn, with many a 
priceless gem, and a necklace of emeralds, each stone 
the size of a large marble. Thus apparelled, a woman 
of middle age, who had superintended the toilette, 
stepped forth and motioned her with graceful ges¬ 
ture to follow. The unhappy Lady of Cawnpore, with 
tottering steps, obeyed. The woman led her through 
many a winding gallery, ablaze with light, and at 
last stopped before a door which she opened, motion¬ 
ing her to enter. Madam Gregory did so. The 
door was instantly closed, to the snap of a turned 
lock. She found herself in a room of rose-colored 
marble, at one end whereof hung rich curtains, be¬ 
yond which she could not see. Abundance of flowers 
shed an enervating perfume, and around the wains¬ 
cot ran those low couches which are the feature in 
oriental households. A dim light lit up this sybaritic 
room, but, without pausing an instant, Madame 
Gregory rushed to the window, and in another 
moment would have precipitated herself upon the 
ground which stretched beneath. But as she laid 


38 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


her hand upon the sill, a man, concealed behind the 
curtains, rushed upon her and clutched her by the 
arm. She gave a succession of piercing screams, 
which proclaimed to her own courageous soul, what 
she would not own before, that all was over. In the 
man who held her she recognized the fire-eyed Prince 
Fazal. She understood, in a flash, why she had been 
allowed to remain the sole survivor of the massacre. 
She was a gift from the Nana to this sycophantic 
satellite, with whom she was now left captive and 
alone, in a chamber adjoining one of the most fright¬ 
ful rooms of the frightful palace of Bithoor. 


MRS. mincer’s boarding-house. 


39 


CHAPTER I. 

MRS. mincer’s boarding-house. 

Mrs. Mincer had just finished a task to which she 
periodically applied herself whenever it became nec¬ 
essary to deal diplomatically with any of her several 
boarders. She had been writing a note, and she read 
it over carefully, in order to see that everything was 
correct. It was worded thus: 

New York, June ist, 1886. 

Mrs. Mincer presents her compliments to Mrs. 
Orme, and begs to say that she has no objection to 
taking up the carpet and putting down matting in¬ 
stead, if there is a reasonable certainty of Mrs. Orme 
remaining during the summer months. 

Yes, that seemed to answer very well. “ Mrs. 
Mincer presents her compliments,” sounded aristo¬ 
cratic and genteel. She had seen such phraseology 
in books of etiquette, and could not doubt that it was 
the correct thing. The last part of the composition 
also pleased her. “ Reasonable certainty of Mrs. 
Orme remaining during the summer months,” had a 
business-like air, while at the same time it rolled off 
the tongue with an almost musical cadence. It sig¬ 
nified Mrs. Mincer’s willingness to oblige, even though 
by incurring some expense, provided there was a 
suitable guarantee that, to employ her own phrase¬ 
ology, she “ would not get left.” 



40 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


“ Great Scott!” exclaimed Mrs. Mincer, to herself, 
as she paused over this epistle. “ Suppose they 
should go! Suppose every boarder in the house 
should leave! Suppose, after all, I should get left!” 

She sat for a few moments with a frown upon her 
pretty features. Evidently the thought, though not 
unfamiliar, was too painful to meet with encourage¬ 
ment, for, ringing the bell, she gave the note to the 
responsive chambermaid, who forthwith carried it to 
Mrs. Orme in the second-story front room. 

Mrs. Mincer kept a boarding-house. She had done 
so for many years, without being able to testify to 
the lucrativeness of that business or to any pleasure 
it might be capable of conferring. She was a little 
woman of remarkably beautiful figure, and with one 
streak of gray mingling in an abundance of brown 
hair brushed plainly back. She always gave you the 
impression of having at hand masked batteries which 
she could open upon you on the least provocation 
and the smallest notice. Yet this impression was not 
wholly correct, for she had one of the biggest hearts 
in the world, and one of the most hospitable and 
generous dispositions. Though an accomplished 
maitresse depension , she never had a dollar remaining 
at the end of the year. Her exorbitant rent—what 
rents in New York are not exorbitant ?—was paid in 
advance with the utmost punctuality on the first day 
of every month ; and when the cook and the cham¬ 
bermaid had been satisfied, and the coal and the gas 
man made happy, and the claims of the grocer, the 
butcher, and the milk-man been regarded, the little 
woman had not as much left for new bonnets and 
becoming gowns, not to mention an occasional mat- 


MRS. mincer’s boarding-house. 


41 


in6e at the theatre, as she desired. She was too ex 
travagant ever to grow rich, and had been known to 
commit the enormity of buying peaches, for deep- 
dish pies, at a fruiterer’s. No boarding-house keeper 
with such tendencies was ever known to accumulate. 
Add to this that she always had a list of pensioners 
on hand. She did not shrink more from the cast-out 
woman she met in the streets than from the tramp to 
to whom she gave a hot meal in her tidiest of tidy 
kitchens. The pauper in the last stages of consump¬ 
tion, the humble friend whose resources were ten 
times less than her own, the boarder overtaken with 
financial disaster and unable to pay his weekly bill, 
were treated with a compassion which would have 
been Christian, if, with her, it had not been simply 
human. Meanwhile, she solaced her childlessness 
with a variety of pets. The lower portion of her 
house was a sort of distributed menagerie, in which 
the inmates wandered at will with the exception of 
those which would have aroused the predatory in¬ 
stincts of the others. A dull and vicious parrot 
which had never mastered the vernacular sufficiently 
to get further than “ polly wants a crack—” (and 
which was frequently threatened by the evil-minded, 
with a literal compliance with its request), flourished 
in a cage near the basement window, where it was 
furtively jeered at and exacerbated by an occasional 
boarder more audacious than the rest. A canary, 
blind in one eye and lame in one leg, sang exult¬ 
antly in its wire prison just above, and taught a 
lesson in optimism to such of us as believe that life 
is not worth living, unless everything is perfection. 
An Angora cat, christened Wellington, with outra- 



42 


TH& LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


geous whiskers and a purr that sounded like a dis¬ 
creetly modulated snore, roamed amid the guests at 
meal-times, and divided attention with a huge Maltese 
named Christopher Columbus. A black-and-tan 
which spent most of the twenty-four hours in barking, 
and lost no opportunity of snapping at the heels of 
strange visitors whose personality it deemed inimical 
to its interests, led a life of voluptuous ease in the 
parlor, and was thoroughly detested by everybody 
but its mistress. Finally, in a small back room on 
the first floor, there had formerly pined a monkey, 
which, like Lady Clara Vere de Vere, sickened of a 
vague disease, and was finally chloroformed by an 
unknown hand one summer when Mrs. Mincer was 
taking a short vacation. 

Mrs. Mincer’s house was generally full, but recent¬ 
ly there had been a considerable defection, and she 
spent a part of every day in carefully calculating in 
her alert brain whether or not the red flag would not 
have to go up and she herself be compelled to turn 
her abilities in a new and more remunerative channel. 
It would be difficult to tell whether Mrs. Mincer ever 
attained a “ realizing sense ” that it might one day be 
necessary to do this. The red flag had often fluttered 
before her imagination; but so unreflective an animal 
as a bull can grow accustomed to scarlet, and from 
long contemplation of the possibility of such a ca¬ 
lamity, Mrs. Mincer was not prepared to take fire until 
she saw it actually impending. To revert to her own 
language, she “ didn’t scare worth a cent.” She was 
habituated to employing that degree of slang winch 
may be described as the vernacular with the veneer 
off; and the audacity with which she made free with 


MRS. mincer’s boarding-house. 


43 


the mother-tongue was equalled only by the boldness 
with which she scanned the future and questioned 
the prospects it held out. 

The man who thinks it an easy thing to keep a 
boarding-house in New York, and at the same time 
to maintain a conscience void of offense, and enjoy 
the peace of mind which is said to pass all under¬ 
standing, had better try to keep one if he wishes to 
correct such an impression. Boarding-house life in 
New York usually consists of a not always silent 
warfare between the entertainers and the entertained 
—if that be not too smooth a phrase to signify the 
relationship of those who pay a weekly stipend for 
food and lodging with those who are paid. Such a 
mode of existence offers better opportunity for mu¬ 
tual hatred than almost any other in a civilized com¬ 
munity; and it has yet to be satisfactorily explained 
to the seeker after wisdom why the average landlady 
winds up the week with corned beef and cabbage, 
unless it be for the cunningly disguised purpose of 
providing hash for breakfast on the ensuing Monday. 
Then comes the further question, why hash for Mon¬ 
day’s breakfast? Dyspepsia is said to be a distinct¬ 
ively American disease; but is it not due to the 
enormous number of our boarding-houses? “ Is this 
a regular boarding-house, or—or a private family ?” 
a lady once asked of Mrs. Mincer when that estimable 
little woman answered the door-bell herself. “ This 
is a regular boarding-house,” w 7 as the reply, with that 
inimitable nasal sneer with which Mrs. Mincer was 
wont to crush any adversary who threw down the 
gauge. And so it was ; but though everything went 
on there with the regularity of an eight-day clock, 


44 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


and the little woman herself threw in melodious 
chimes with her bright repartee and hopeful way of 
looking at matters, war was generally impending in 
some quarter or other, and the dyspepsia whereof we 
speak was encouraged by that reciprocal dislike 
which runs down one side of the table and up the 
other until the whole environment becomes wrathful. 

Suppose you, dear madam, who may be reading 
these pages, and who dwell in a snug little home of 
your own, where your cares of management are lim¬ 
ited to giving orders and seeing that they are at¬ 
tended to, were compelled to have a procession of 
strange people troop through your house year after 
year—people who thought that the money they paid 
you every week gave them " right to be insolent, 
ungrateful, and slanderous; who gave as little as 
they could for more than they needed, and begrudged 
even what they gave: What would you think of 
that ? Suppose you were indebted for the food you 
ate, the clothes you wore, and the bed you slept on, 
to the money given by people of this sort, who are 
precisely the sort of which the average boarding¬ 
house is composed—do you think you would be able 
to maintain that repose of manner which is ascribed 
to every gentlewoman ? Are you of the opinion that 
you could present a smiling front to the world in 
general, and have a kind word and a bright saying 
for each of your particular friends ? On the other 
hand, would you not sooner or later degenerate into 
the conventional landlady, with a frown on her brow 
and calculation in her eye, carrying the burden of 
her unrented rooms around with her, wherever she 
went, and wondering how everything was to turn out, 


MRS. mincer’s boarding-house. 


45 


up to the day when she herself should be carried, feet 
foremost, to that last lodging-place where no meals 
are ever given or required ? 

Mrs. Mincer's experience had been very great. 
She had had the genteel boarder who moves in the 
first society, but is subsequently discovered to have 
only fluttered about its outermost edge. She had 
had the temperance lecturer who has his periodic at¬ 
tacks of delirium tremens, and who learns in mania- 
a-potu what he describes upon the platform. She 
had had the gentleman with expectations, who had 
calmly lived on her for a year at a time, without be¬ 
traying the color of his cash, and whom she had 
finally to get rid of because his favorite aunt refused 
either to part with her money as long as she had life, 
or to part with her life in order that he might get 
her money. She had had the woman who takes nar¬ 
cotics when she does not drink, and drinks when 
she gives up narcotics, and who is finally destined 
to become a tramp in the streets unless she dies 
in the hospital. She had had the pleasant young 
gentleman whose references were the Young 
Men's Christian Association, who got his meals 
and lodgings with her for a week, pending the 
arrival of his trunk, and who, on the morning 
of the day when it was expected, vanished away 
simultaneously with a gold watch from the ad¬ 
joining room, and was no more seen forever. 
She had had the pious adventuress, who claimed to 
be a retired belle from official society in Washington, 
and who, one night at eleven o’clock, was myste¬ 
riously taken away in a carriage by a strange man ac¬ 
companied by a policeman. She had had the widow 


46 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


whose music teacher—a handsom-e young man 
came to give her instructions upon the piano three 
afternoons in the week, but to whom she had had to 
give warning because of the dead silence of that in¬ 
strument except during the first and last five min¬ 
utes of each lesson. She had had the visionary busi¬ 
ness man who expected to make a fortune by im¬ 
porting flowers from Palestine, and got himself into 
Ludlow Street Jail instead ; and the travelling sales¬ 
man who peddled gloves from one end of the Union 
to the other; and the stock-company actor, who had 
to have his dinner an hour before everybody else, in 
order that digestion might accomplish its perfect 
work ere the curtain rose, and the church soprano 
whose life was weariness because she didn’t know 
any newspaper man who would puff her in the Sun¬ 
day papers. 

The result of these multifarious experiences was 
that Mrs. Mincer had reached the conclusion that 
the angel in human nature was something like that 
truth which is said to lie at the bottom of a well— 
the muddiness which also abounds at the depths pre¬ 
vents its being seen. The successful battles she had 
waged with boarders who, in the account book of 
her memory were marked “No good,” were as won¬ 
derful as the campaigns of Napoleon. Most of these 
had been routed with great slaughter, so to speak, 
either because their views of punctual payment did 
not tally with Mrs. Mincer’s preconceived notions of 
equity, or because of some trick of manner or behav¬ 
ior, which jarred against her sensibilities. Some¬ 
times she encountered these dismissed boarders in 
aftei years* under circumstances which made her 


MRS. mincer’s boarding-house. 


47 


think of Mr. Beecher’s unnoticed saying that we 
meet everybody twice—once as he is going up, and 
once as he is going down ; but, up or down, Mrs. 
Mincer said she had “no use’’for boarders whom 
she had once dismissed. Consequently the occasions 
when she bestowed recognition on delinquents of 
that description were extremely rare. Once they 
came under her ban, they remained there, and no 
person living could forbid those bans. 

Among the persons whom Mrs. Mincer would 
have liked to retain, indefinitely, were Mrs. Orme 
and her daughter Beatrice, who had continued there 
during the winter and spring, and concerning whom 
the question now was whether they would remain 
during the rummer—that trying season, so difficult 
for those who advertise for boarders and lodgers, to 
bridge over comfortably. No use in reminding Mrs. 
Mincer that, legally, there was no distress for rent in 
New York. She always replied that she experienced 
a great deal of distress in raising it. 

Mrs. Orme was the lady with whom Mrs. Mincer 
had just been communicating with regard to possi¬ 
ble matting. As an occupant, with her daughter, of 
the two front rooms on the second story, she held 
the place of honor in the household. She was a 
widow of about sixty years of age, and had 
dressed for many a twelvemonth in deep mourning, 
typical of a sorrow which she evidently held very 
closely to her heart, since even her smile had a pen¬ 
siveness that it was not easy to suppose congruous 
with nothing but happy memories. Her tresses, 
once fair, were now quite white, and her large blue 
eyes beamed with a tenderness which seemed to ex- 



4 8 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


tend to almost every earthly thing. Sometimes she 
looked as though she had been dazed and had never 
quite recovered, and it was on this account that you 
forgave her for lending so much attention to trivial 
things. It was as though the mind, having once 
been under the strain of an intolerable burden, now 
sought relief in voluntary and continuous recourse 
to the commonplace. Her two passions—aside from 
Beatrice, who was her one idol—were early morning 
service and afternoon teas. She regarded her pas¬ 
tor, the Rev. Marmaduke Allan, with something of 
the reverence with which the average Roman Catho¬ 
lic contemplates the Pope. It was to his church, the 
Church of Saint Remigius, that her steps wended 
at half-past seven every morning, rain or shine ; and 
when no other worshipper was present, not even her 
daughter, as sometimes happened, she knelt in her 
pew alone, absorbed in the service, and in the rich 
voice of the rector, as completely as though the 
church were teeming with dearly beloved brethren. 

Her delight in afternoon teas and kaffee-klatches 
was equally great. Born in England and partially 
educated there, she yet came of a distinguished 
Philadelphia family, and if ever she boasted of any¬ 
thing, that was the theme. She deplored the fact 
that her limited means no longer permitted her to 
move “ in society ” to the extent to which she desired, 
for her daughter’s sake, be it remembered, at least as 
much as for her own. In her youth the word “ bud,” , 
as it is now prettily used in its girlish designation, 
was unknown ; but she had certainly once been a 
bud of undeniable beauty, and it was because she 
had been unable to introduce Beatrice, at the bud 


MRS. mincer’s boarding-house. 


49 


age, to the world of fashion, under the most distin¬ 
guished auspices, that she grieved early and late. 

Beatrice, on the other hand, was too proud to be 
greatly discontented w ith her lot, too proud to show 
that it was pride alone that saved her from extreme 
discontent. She was quite as alive to the advantages 
of wealth as any one can be who has moved inti¬ 
mately among the wealthy with an exceedingly slim 
purse. She laid a high appreciation upon good birth 
and exalted position, and was not entirely free from 
that corroding envy which one feels who, born to 
ride in a carriage, is compelled to descend to the 
street-car. When she contrasted their two rooms— 
one a hall bed-room—prettily as they were furnished, 
with the all but regal mansions to which she and her 
mother were ever welcome, and cards to which, to 
Mrs. Mincer’s delight, were invariably left for them 
on the occasion of any grand festivity, she could not 
imitate the serenity of the philosopher who told 
Alexander the Great that all he asked of him was to 
stand out of his light. 

In short, you cannot put the head of Diogenes on 
the shoulders of Diana. 

Mrs. Orme and her daughter, needless to say, kept 
themselves aloof from the cliques and cabals into 
which the inmates were divided, but the important 
question of matting on the floor for summer at 
length came up. With what result we have recorded. 
Mrs. Mincer was perfectly willing to provide the mat¬ 
ting on the condition that her guests would remain. 
Mother and daughter were pondering this question 
when Mrs. Mincer’s note reached them. Mrs. Orme 
was inclined to go out of town because it was the 



5 ° 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


thing, and nothing disturbed her repose more than 
not to do, or rather not to be able to do, what she 
thought society required of her, and her social posi¬ 
tion demanded. On the other hand, it was perfectly 
certain that during the summer she could live mere 
comfortably and cheaply in Mrs. Mincer’s cool and 
shaded rooms, that faced the south, than in some 
seaside cottage or hotel, where all the luxuries and 
some of the comforts of life were lacking, and where 
her poverty would be made more conspicuous than 
at home. 

While these questions were being debated a ring 
came at the front door. The servant, answering it, 
showed a gentleman into the parlor and took his card 
upstairs. Mrs. Mincer, who was seated in the parlor, 
immediately recognized in the visitor the Rev. Mar- 
maduke Allan. He had indeed for some time been a 
constant visitor at the house, calling upon Mrs. and 
Miss Orrae much oftener than his pastoral duties 
required ; and people did say,— 

Mrs. Mincer, the only other occupant of the room, 
bent her usual keen look upon the clergyman. He 
was young, and his parish was one of the largest in 
New York and not at all remarkable for wealth. He 
was so strikingly and uniquely handsome that had 
he gone on the stage he would have made a Romeo 
of severe type—a Romeo dashed with Hamlet. His 
complexion was entirely void of that cadaverous 
American tint which makes so many of our young 
men look weazen ere they have reached thirty. His 
gold-brown hair would have set his face as in a 
frame, had it not been rather closely clipped and thus 
revealed the square and symmetrical head. There 


MRS. mincer’s BOARDING-HOUSE. 51 

was nothing conventionally clerical about him, not 
even the white tie with which so many of the cloth 
indicate that they are up to the neck in theology. 
He looked more like a somewhat fashionable young 
man paying an evening visit, saving that he wore a 
frock-coat ; and the profoundly contemplative gaze 
that dwelt in his dark blue eyes put one 'more in 
mind of Page’s wonderful anthropomorphic “ Head of 
Christ,” than of the average clergyman ready with a 
word in season and waiting to “ improve the oc¬ 
casion.” 

But as Mrs. Mincer sat looking at him, after her 
first “ Good-evening,” she perceived, with the pene¬ 
tration of a wonderfully sharp nature, that some¬ 
thing was the matter. Mr. Allan was a man of the 
world as well as a clergyman, and his self-possession 
was a fine art which had its roots in steady nerves. 
This evening there was something in his manner 
which betokened an excitability beyond his power to 
control. His hands and eyes were restless. He bit 
his lips, moved uneasily, and more than once passed 
his handkerchief across his brow. Something had 
obviously much perturbed him, and Mrs. Mincer sat 
wondering whether the organist was sick, whether 
the choristers had “struck,” whether the sexton had 
disappeared in the interests of a prolonged debauch 
(as he had twice been known to do), or whether the 
laundress who washed and ironed the choir’s sur- 
1 plices had failed to return them and was nowhere to 
be found. Mr. Allan made no attempt to relieve her 
curiosity, and in fact had not spoken a word—vastly 
singular conduct in a man who had at his tongue’s 
end plenty of that small talk in which the little 




52 


THE LADY 0F CAWNPORE. 


woman delighted, and who used to tell her stories 
which made her quite forget his odor of sanctity. 

“ Ain’t you well, this evening, Mr. Allan,” she had 
just begun, as Annie, the plump maid, who looked 
as though she was born grinning, returned and asked 
Mr. Allan to walk up stairs. 

“ Well, quite well, thanks,” replied that gentleman. 
Yet, as he left the parlor, he turned slightly pale,and 
his steps lingered upon the stairs up which he usually 
ran. When he reached Mrs. Orme’s door he paused 
for a moment before knocking. As he stood thus, 
heaving a deep sigh, a forlorn wail, as from a dam¬ 
aged Stradivarius, wandered down through the dark¬ 
ness of the hall above, and seemed to come from a 
garret at the back of the house. Then he composed 
his features and prepared to give his usual knock, 
yet hesitated still in a manner strikingly at variance 
with his characteristic firmness and expedition. 

Meantime the forlorn wail still continued ; so far 
as the composition which it was intended to interpret 
was concerned, it was a fitting accompaniment to the 
interview to which the Rev. Marmaduke Allan now 
found himself committed. In fact the dim and mel¬ 
ancholy music broke out at fitful intervals long after 
that interview was over. The musician was Mr. 
Mincer,—but really he is so unimportant a figure that 
we had entirely forgotten him. 


THE REV. MARMADUKE ALLAN. 


53 


CHAPTER II. 

THE REV. MARMADUKE ALLAN. 

The Rev. Marmaduke Allan was a man of very con¬ 
siderable wealth. His mother had died in his infancy, 
and the money had been bequeathed him by his 
father (who left this world in the prime of life), 
upon one condition, which we shall presently specify. 
An orphan at a very early age, Marmaduke had been 
left to the guardianship of Dr. Billington, who had 
been his father’s family physician, and was also his 
executor. Dr. Billington became a widower a few 
years after his marriage, and had never wedded again. 
He had one child, a son, somewhat younger than 
Marmaduke, and the two boys had been educated to¬ 
gether, livingunder the same roof-tree and attending 
the same school and college. They had been affec¬ 
tionate playmates in boyhood, their very different 
characters and tastes separating them widely as they 
approached man’s estate, and lessening their intimacy 
to some extent, but never entirely impairing their 
friendship. 

Dr. Billington was a rather cynical man to have the 
sole guardianship of two youths. He was absorbed 
in his profession, and as a specialist had established 
a wide reputation for his brilliantly successful treat¬ 
ment of disorders of nerve and brain. He had re¬ 
alized a fortune which would have easily enabled 


54 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


him to retire, but he was as fond of making money as 
of curing neurasthenia—much fonder, indeed, if the 
whispers of his less fortunate brethren were to be 
believed. No statement was more common than that 
he was a humbug ; no statement had ever been ac¬ 
companied with less proof. It was asserted that he 
turned penniless applicants from his door without 
mercy or medicine, and that he allowed rich patients 
to linger under nervous prostration until he had 
drained them of all that their credulity was willing 
to supply. These things were whispered by many 
members of the medical fraternity of all schools. 
Meantime his ante-room was full; the line of patients 
was unbroken ; and his fee of twenty dollars for the 
first consultation and ten dollars for each that fol¬ 
lowed was paid in sufficiently swift succession to keep 
his coffers full. 

There was one object the doctor loved even more 
than money and his profession. That object was his son 
George. He loved him more than anything on earth or 
in the heavens above the earth. He had petted him, 
caressed him, and spoiled him in every possible way 
from the child’s earliest years. The only difference 
in his treatment of George and of Marmaduke was 
seen in this excessive devotion to his son. The result 
was that at the age of twenty-six George had as well- 
ruined a disposition as any one was likely to have 
whose life had been made as smooth and easy as pos¬ 
sible by a wealthy father’s hand. He had been edu¬ 
cated to be a “ gentleman which usually means that 
a boy has been given the best of everything to eat, 
drink and wear, with nothingto do, and an entire life¬ 
time to do it in. 


THE REV. MARMADUKE ALLAN. 


55 


On the other hand, Marmaduke had been brought 
up with a strictness which had more justice in it than 
severity. If there had been no affection between him 
and his guardian, mutual respect seemed to have 
taken its place, and there was no absolute dislike. 
Both boys had entered college at an unusually early 
age ; but George for some flagrant breach of disci¬ 
pline, had been censured by the faculty, and since 
censure, in any form, from anybody, or for any cause, 
was an insult he could not brook, he had haughtily 
departed the next morning, was received with open 
arms by his father, who not only reviled the 
faculty for their presumption, but gave his darling a 
check for some thousands of dollars, with which the 
young man incontinently went to Europe, or rather 
to Paris, telegraphing for more whenever his pursuit 
of the beautiful Hydra named pleasure caused his 
credit to get low. By the time he returned, Marma¬ 
duke had been graduated and had entered the church. 
It would be useless to deny that the wealth and the 
social status of the young man might have indirectly 
secured him a position which many a poor incumbent 
would have looked upon with an envy that is seldom 
the less for burning beneath the chasuble. His no¬ 
tion of the fitness of things, however, led him to seek 
a more humble and obscure benefice than the one he 
might have had. Among the poor of the parish of 
which he thus found himself pastor, and which yielded 
only the scanty income of fifteen hundred a year, 
a portion of his large private revenue, wisely distrib¬ 
uted, was capable, he thought, of accomplishing more 
good than among a wealthier congregation. In this 
way his riches were a comfort to him ; but they had 


5 6 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


one great drawback, which, ever since he had been a 
youth, had brought him nothing but annoyance and 
grief. 

We alluded to a condition upon which he remained 
his father’s heir. That condition was that in the 
event of his marrying, all the income accruing from 
his father’s property should be forfeited by him for¬ 
ever, and be diverted to various charitable purposes 
specified in the will. This extraordinary proviso 
could not help being known among the circle in 
which Marmaduke and the Billingtons moved. The 
consequence was that as he approached his twenty- 
first year he was politely shunned by mothers who 
had marriageable daughters. He was universally ac¬ 
knowledged to be a charming young man—too 
charming in fact; for no mother, who wished to do 
her duty by her daughter, could endure seeing her 
fall in love with a delightful young millionaire who 
on the day that he was married would cease to have 
a penny. The situation was so immensely provoking 
that the emotion it excited reached the proportions 
of the sublime. Marmaduke early experienced all the 
mortification of discovering that the rich man is de¬ 
spised the moment he becomes poor. Ere he was of 
age he despaired of ever finding any girl who would 
love him for what he was, not for what he had could 
he have married her and kept it. He felt like Dives 
being metamorphosed into Lazarus. He was Dives 
as long as he remained a bachelor ; Lazarus, the mo¬ 
ment he placed a wedding ring upon a woman’s 
finger. 

It was while he was feeling excessively bitter over 
these circumstances that he obtained the pastorate 


THE REV. MARMADUKE ALLAN. 57 

of the Church of St. Remigius. The perspicacious 
reader will ask why he did not solve the problem by 
contesting the will, and, if judgment went against 
him, abandoning his wealth and leaving himself free 
to choose wherever he would then have the oppor¬ 
tunity. To this it may be answered that he had no 
desire to contest the will. In fact, the idea of doing 
so never entered his head, and he would have indig¬ 
nantly repudiated it had it been suggested. In the 
second place, to abandon all claim to a large fortune, 
and all the innumerable advantages resulting from 
it, is a very serious step, not to be taken without long 
consideration. Marmaduke was not one of those 
who are inclined to make lamp-lighters or sandwiches 
of bank-notes, merely because the supply is not 
readily exhaustible. He was not without hope that 
somewhere in the w'orld existed a woman who, aware 
of the impoverishing condition awaiting his mar¬ 
riage, would yet love him sufficiently to accept with¬ 
out a murmur the penury which would then be his 
lot—some girl who, not submissive to the avaricious 
counsel of a money-seeking mother, would dare to 
judge for herself and act according to the dictates of 
a wise and loving heart. But besides these consider¬ 
ations another had lately arisen, which we shall ex¬ 
plain further on. Sufficient to say that if he behaved 
according to its loudly speaking voice, he would be 
left even without the poor stipend vouchsafed him by 
the Church of St. Remigius, and would therefore be 
an absolutely penniless Benedict. 

It was before this last consideration had presented 
itself to him in all its full force, that accident made 
him acquainted with Mrs. and Miss Orme. About 


58 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


six months previous to the date at which our first 
chapter opens, Mrs. Orrae was much of an invalid, 
and had spent some weeks amid the pine-laden air 
of Lakewood. Fate directed that Marmaduke should 
repair thither early in January in order to recover 
from a severe cold which had rendered him inca¬ 
pable of conducting the services. Imprisoned for 
nearly two weeks in a small hotel, where the guests 
were few and the attractions trivial, the young man 
found in Mrs. Orme and her daughter two women, 
whom, it seemed to him, he had been looking for all 
his life. He had, of course, no recollection of his 
mother. No other woman had ever taken the place 
of one; and Mrs. Orme, with her gentle voice, her 
pensive eyes, and her charming manner, which had 
an air, where he was concerned, of almost reverential 
entreaty, appealed to all those filial feelings which 
never until now had found opportunity for full ex¬ 
pression. And as for Beatrice, he had given her only 
one full look when he felt a beating of the heart 
which told him that that mysterious entity, Love, 
had entered there and taken lease for life. The three 
formed themselves into an indissoluble little party. 
They were always together. Two surprises awaited 
him. One was that they had been attendants at the 
Church of St. Remigius during the incumbency of 
his predecessor, which had ended only a short time 
ago, and that they expected to return to it when 
their sojourn at Lakewood should be over. The sec¬ 
ond was that leading, on the whole, a very retired 
life, and receiving little company, they were entirely 
ignorant that the new rector was a man of wealth, 


THE REV. MARMADUKE ALLAN. 59 

and consequently that his possession of it was 
coupled with any condition whatever. 

Marmaduke revelled in the paradise thus found. 
Lakewood became to him an Arabia Felix in ex¬ 
change for the Arabia Petra he had trodden so long. 
Tasting for the first time in his life the initiatory rap¬ 
ture of the master-passion, and feeling certain that 
the words he as yet did not dare to utter, were not 
entirely unguessed by either mother or daughter, he 
could not bring himself to acquaint them, however 
skilfully and indirectly, with facts which had al¬ 
ready caused him so much suffering. It was a de¬ 
lightful novelty for him to be thought poor, to be 
valued entirely on account of what he appeared to be 
—a young man who felt himself called to the minis¬ 
try of the word of God, and with no other income 
than that derived from the work of hand and brain. 
His heart had been irretrievably lost on meeting 
Beatrice. Her dark, almost oriental eyes, had 
looked into his with a naif wonder at the charm of 
his beauty and the fresh music of his voice; and 
while she was thus fascinated against her will, she 
fascinated in return. Marmaduke, as it were, lost 
himself in her eyes, and roused himself by an effort 
from that momentary trance, in which a mysterious 
curtain, lifted for a moment, seemed to have intro¬ 
duced him into a new world of strange beauty. 
Beatrice was a mixture of demureness and audacity. 
Hers was one of those rare natures which can laugh 
at every conventionality at the call of imperative 
duty. The fire of an impetuous and ardent nature 
burned beneath a manner calm, cool and quiet. She 
had met a score of young men who had everything 


6o 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


that is desirable in the eyes of the world, except 
manliness. She had now met for the first time one 
who in every point answered requirements, which, 
until that moment, she had never defined and ac¬ 
knowledged even to herself. If she could have 
named one objection it would have been his profes¬ 
sion, for she had not yet been deeply touched by re¬ 
ligion, and she was vaguely conscious of a certain 
discontent that so much brilliancy of manner and 
such charm of personality should be hidden in the 
little chancel of an unimportant church. 

At the expiration of his two weeks’ vacation it was 
hard work for him to return to his pastorate. But 
he was consoled by the departure of mother 
and daughter from Lakewood a week later. They 
found rooms at Mrs. Mincer’s, resumed their attend¬ 
ance at the Church of St. Remigius, and took up 
again the tranquil and uneventful life to which they 
were accustomed. 

It was only after Marmaduke had got back to his 
charge, and face to face with his sacred duties again, 
that he realized that he was practising a sort of de¬ 
ception upon both Mrs. Orme and her daughter. 
He had been so accustomed to have the average 
mamma smile upon him when she heard that he was 
a Croesus, and turn her back upon him and scurry 
off with her daughter under her arm when she 
learned the other half of the story, that he could not 
bring himself to tell the entire truth to his new 
friends, until he felt unalterably sure of Beatrice. 
But meanwhile fate, which would relieve us of a 
great deal of unnecessary work if we only gave her 


THE REV. MARMADUKE ALLAN. 


61 


a chance, was quickly loosening the Gordian knot 
which clumsy mortals are compelled to cut. 

One morning, after early service was over, and 
Mrs. Orme and Beatrice were on their way home, 
they were joined by one of those dear old ladies (we 
have all met them) who mix tattle with their piety 
and employ gossip as though it were a means of 
grace. 

“ Did you hear,” asked the old lady, “ that Mr. Al¬ 
lan is going to move from the parsonage next month 
and go into the new house that he has bought on 
Fifth Avenue ?” 

Mother and daughter glanced at each other in a 
mute amazement that was sufficient reply. 

“Didn’t hear of it?” almost shrieked the old lady, 
standing still and laying a detaining hand upon an 
arm of each. Then, catching the look of incredulity 
on both faces, and perceiving that it betrayed a pro¬ 
fundity of ignorance that demanded instant enlight¬ 
enment, she continued: 

“ Do you mean to say you don’t know that he is 
rich—very rich ?” 

“ Rich ?” exclaimed Mrs. Orme, in a dazed voice. 

“ Very rich ?” exclaimed Beatrice in a tone that 
sounded almost accusing. 

“ Very rich ! And that’s the reason he’s a bachelor. 
Let me tell you all about it.” And with a fluency 
that rippled over mispronunciation and unlawful 
grammar, as the brook ripples over pebbles and 
boulders on its way to the ocean, she poured forth 
the whole story of Marmaduke’s unique position, and 
only brought the narrative to an end as her hearers 
reached Mrs. Mincer’s door. 



62 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


“ Beatrice ! Beatrice !” exclaimed Mrs. Orme after 
breakfast was over, and they were alone in their 
rooms. “ He had a right to say nothing to us about 
his own affairs if he so chose. But to think that 
such a man should be doomed to remain single. It 
is cruel, it is unjust.” 

“ Mamma,” said Beatrice taking her mother’s 
hands, and looking at her with a quiet smile. “ He 
is not doomed to remain single.” 

“Why, my dear child, what do you mean ?” ques¬ 
tioned Mrs. Orme, who was constitutionally incapable 
of associating the ideas of happiness and poverty. 
“As he cannot marry and keep his money, of course 
he won’t marry at all.” 

“Yes he will,” answered Beatrice softly. “I—I 
was going to tell you last night.” And then she 
threw her arms around her mother’s neck and whis¬ 
pered something in her ear, which made Mrs. Orme 
start, then clutch her wildly, then exclaim “ Beatrice ! 
Beatrice !” in mournful and broken accents. 

“You remember,” said Beatrice when the emotion 
had passed, and the two sat together confidentially 
holding each other’s hands, “ that yesterday morning 
you were not feeling well, and I went to church alone. 
After service, as I was leaving, the sexton stopped me 
and told me a long story about his wife, who is laid 
up with rheumatism. Just as I got away, Mr. Allan— 
Marmaduke—came from the vestry down the aisle 
and joined me.” She paused. 

“ And it was then ?” asked her mother, looking at 
her timidly. 

“Yes,” replied Beatrice simply, “ it was then. He 


THE REV. MARMADUKE ALLAN. 63 

explained to me how poor we should be, for the 
present,—” 

“ Ah !” interrupted Mrs. Orme, her devotion to her 
pastor returning in full strength, and mingling with 
those more familiar feelings which send a glow 
through the heart of a woman prepared to love her 
future son-in-law, “a young man with his gifts will 
not remain long in a pastorate like that. If I were 
bishop I would put him at the head of the richest 
congregation in the state. My dear child !” she 
continued, growing excited, as her thoughts reverted 
to one of her favorite themes. “ I knew, of course, 
that the poor we have always with us. More’s the 
pity. They ought to be by themselves. You know 
as well as I do that Mr. Allan—I suppose / must call 
him Marmaduke now; it almost sounds sacrilegious— 
was born to shine in society, and society does not go 
to the Church of St. Remigius. There is not a good 
family in the congregation excepting ours. Mrs. 
Sharpe” (that was the old lady who had joined them 
that morning) “ belonged to a good family, but she 
married beneath her. Her husband was book-keeper 
in a local express company. Her mother was a 
Bedell, and was descended from the Oglethorpes of 
Georgia. Her father was a Van Dam. His great- 
great-grand-father was one of the Van Dams that 
came over with Hendrick Hudson. But, dearest 
child, how could you let me sleep last night, without 
telling me? And to think of the irregular manner in 
which the thing was conducted. Mr. Allan should 
haven spoken first to me.” 

“ It was because you couldn’t sleep last night for 
so many hours that I did not tell you. Yes, the whole 




6 4 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


thing was irregular. He knew it. I knew it. The 
fact is I don’t think he intended to speak just then. 
He came upon me unawares, and,—” She paused, 
reddening and hiding her face on her mother’s breast. 

“ I suppose he couldn’t help it,” said the mother, 
stroking her darling’s hair with gentle hand. 

“That’s just what he said. He said he couldn’t 
help it. And I couldn’t help it either.” 

Useless to add that the next time Marmaduke 
called, which was that very afternoon, everything 
was explained by him, and all was forgiven. The 
immensity of the sacrifice he was making in order to 
become her daughter’s husband struck Mrs. Orme 
more forcibly than anything she had yet encountered 
in the way of personal self-denial, and when he kissed 
her hand on leaving she almost lost for the moment 
her reverence for the priest in her affection for the 
son. 


LOVE AND RELIGION. 


65 


CHAPTER III. 

LOVE AND RELIGION. 

When a young man is in the thralls of his first 
grand passion, the universe wears a rapturous aspect 
for him which it never after wears again. So would 
it have been with Marmaduke, if it were not for the 
fact that at the very moment he asked Beatrice to be 
his wife, his mind was distracted by the most solemn 
and important question that can agitate a human 
being. 

We have referred to a certain consideration which 
held place, among others, in inducing Marmaduke 
not to resign recklessly the fortune of which he was 
the possessor. During the past few months a radical 
change had been at work in the young man’s mind. 
It was not so much induced, in the first place, by the 
study of any particular system of philosophy, as by a 
near acquaintance with human wretchedness forced 
upon him as rector of St. Remigius. The parish was 
large and poor, and he had faithfully performed his 
duty of visitation. The humblest of his parishioners 
could not truthfully complain of being slighted. 
And the young minister, brought up in luxury, ex¬ 
perienced as much amazement and disconcertment at 
finding how many loathsome ingredients may mingle 
in the cup of human misery, as Prince Sakya-Muni 
did when he first became acquainted with the fact of 



66 


THE LADY OF CAWNP0RE. 


death. Visiting alleys, slums, and tenements; com¬ 
ing in contact with filth, ignorance, disease, and vice; 
compelled to listen to stories of family and individual 
crime, which were fit rather for a hoary priest under 
seal of the confessional, than for unaccustomed ears 
like his, he gained an immense apprehension of evil, 
such as he could not have acquired elsewhere. He 
began to think, in the silence of his study. He saw 
that all the misery around him, not a tithe of which 
was he able permanently to relieve, was reduplicated 
in the million pest-holes of the world. He realized 
that it always had existed, like a noisome sewer filled 
with poison flowing through a marble palace, and 
breathing malaria all around. Whatever beauty and 
glory the world possessed was obscured by the 
malignant vapors thus spread over it. He remem¬ 
bered that frightful arraignment of nature made by 
John Stuart Mill, wherein all things are represented 
as destroyer or destroyed, the executioner in turn 
becoming executed. His imagination extended to 
the planets of the solar system, and peopled them 
with all that variety of sentient being of which their 
conditions might admit. But since to be sentient is 
to be capable of suffering, he saw no limit to this ca¬ 
pacity as he stretched the boundaries of thought from 
one solar system to another, from constellation to 
constellation, until the Milky Way, that Gulf Stream 
of the sky, became crowded*with worlds, habitable, 
or to become habitable, the law of suffering entering 
into all. His reason sustained his imagination in this 
lofty flight. For, given the capacity to be happy, 
the capacity to suffer must follow like its shadow. 
When he turned to the pages of Spencer, he dis- 


LOVE AND RELIGION. 


67 


covered no relief in the arguments and theories of 
the great philosopher. He found himself confronted 
with a Force to which no limits were assignable in 
time and space, and of which nothing more could be 
alleged. There was, indeed, mention of a Divine 
Power, but the philosopher gave no reason for assert¬ 
ing divinity of a power which he had previously 
stated to be absolutely unknowable. And when 
Marmaduke turned the pages in feverish solicitude 
as to the manner in which one of the profoundest 
thinkers that ever lived treated those appalling 
calamities which kill thousands at a stroke, he dis¬ 
covered, to his discontent, that explanation was 
evaded, accompanied with the intimation that we 
need not now stop to inquire why the cosmic ar¬ 
rangement was not different from what it is. It was 
after all these experiences, reflections, and researches 
had been repeated over and over again, that the spirit 
of agnosticism settled down upon his intellect like a 
steady storm of snow, until it grew arctic in it's cold¬ 
ness and black in its despair. 

No wonder that his reading of the services became 
perfunctory, and his sermons chillingly ethical. 
Even Mrs. Orme perceived a change, without being 
able to define wherein it consisted or to what it was 
due. A very notable circumstance was, however, 
that, blinded by the infatuation of first love, Beatrice, 
unconscious of the real influences at work, was gradu¬ 
ally beguiled into an interest in religious matters to 
which she had hitherto been a stranger. Ah! how 
many converts have been led into the Christian fold 
through just such a process. In the reading of the 
lessons, coldly as they were now read by Marmaduke, 






68 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


the loveliness of Christ’s life, and the tragedy of His 
death, sank into her heart with the ardor of a new 
revelation. She was, in fact, being led to the foot of 
the cross by one who had turned his back upon it; 
and before the summer had arrived had renewed the 
baptismal vows made for her in her childhood, and 
partaken of the eucharist with all that sweet and 
sacred penitence which comes in the springtime of 
life alone. Strange that she should receive the bread 
and wine from the hands of her lover, who had in¬ 
duced her to partake of them without at the moment 
being conscious of the work of salvation he had 
wrought. Strange that when he repeated, “ This is 
my body which is given for you; do this in remem¬ 
brance of me,” he was already far on his way to the 
belief that Space and Time and all that they contain 
are merely one Infinite Life, to which we creatures of 
a day are less than the molecules that circulate in 
our blood, and that have a clearer idea of what 
human personality is, than all the grandest human 
beings that have ever lived can have of that Unknow¬ 
able which the ages have named God. 

Marmaduke trembled when he beheld Beatrice 
kneeling at the chancel. He had, of course, been 
for some time aware of her spiritual condition, and 
had wondered if any gulf could ever separate them 
because of the change impending in his inner life. 
His mental disquiet had begun before he had met her, 
but he had vaguely hoped that by intensified atten¬ 
tion to his duties it would wear away. But it did 
not wear away, and he saw before him the necessity 
of choosing one of two terrible paths. He must 
either remain a clergyman, practising every hour an 


LOVE AND RELIGION. 


69 


hypocrisy which he loathed; or he must write to the 
bishop, and ask to be deposed. His request would 
of course be complied with. More than that: it 
would instantly be complied -with if he stated the 
unchangeable character of his new convictions and 
urged speediness of action. But thus deprived of the 
slender income yielded by the church, how could he 
possibly marry Beatrice, sacrificing his fortune, as he 
would then be compelled to do? He would be ab¬ 
solutely without means, and he could not invite her 
to share a poverty whose only relief would be the 
small revenue which her mother enjoyed. He had 
asked her to marry him while his mind was yet in 
conflict, before he saw that his conscience would 
compel him to abandon the church; and now that he 
must abandon it, he found himself in a dilemma 
whence he could see no extrication. 

Late one night, weary of the long conflict, he seated 
himself at his desk, and wrote a brief note to the 
bishop, explaining his position, stating that it was ir¬ 
reversible, and asking to be deposed with as little 
delay as possible. Fearing that in his excessive 
agitation he might change his mind, he went out and 
posted the missive as the clock struck the midnight 
hour. A week passed and no answer had yet ar¬ 
rived; and this brings events up to within a few days 
of the date upon which Marmaduke was first intro¬ 
duced to the reader. During those few days a very 
strange affair came to light, which gave a new color 
to his entire existence. 


7o 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


CHAPTER IV. 

DR. BILLINGTON VISITS MARMADUKE. 

We have described Dr. Billington’s son as a young 
man brought up with the idea that the solar system 
was constructed with especial reference to the sine¬ 
cure he was to occupy in it. The world was not his 
oyster which he with sword might open. It was 
already opened for him, with a pearl lying ready. He 
was a Paris who only had to throw a golden apple to 
see femininity at his feet. Living in his father’s 
house, he had nothing to do but fare sumptuously 
every day—but he usually did so at his club, leaving 
Dr. Billington to get through his lonely dinner at 
home, with such consolations as his eminent position 
in the field of therapeutics, and his possession of a 
cellar stocked with rare vintages, were able to supply. 
The doctor did not complain. Whatever bitter 
thoughts may have come to him and added a wrinkle 
to his Voltairish visage, he smothered them in their 
birth, and tried to believe that he was glad his son 
enjoyed himself in his own way. Moreover, he fre¬ 
quently relieved the monotony of his life by accepting 
some of the numerous invitations showered upon him, 
and on rare occasions he gave an entertainment of 
large dimensions, the particulars of which were faith¬ 
fully reported in the morning papers. 

That George had any special proclivities which 


DR. BILLINGTON VISITS MARMADUKE. 


71 


drew him in a single line of action, and gave a bias 
to his life, cannot be asserted. He was one of those 
characters which develop late. He was a member of 
several clubs, yet could not be called a club man. 
On several occasions he had been known voluntarily 
to do Marmaduke the honor of attending the Church 
of St. Remigius, but he was certainly not a church¬ 
man. He had probably gone for the sake of seeing 
how his old schoolmate was getting on, and deter¬ 
mining whether he could preach a sermon that was 
worth attention. Young Mr. Billington had no predi¬ 
lection for law or medicine. He probably thought that 
law was to injustice what medicine was to disease— 
extremely uncertain in its operations, and capable of 
doing more harm than good. He was fairly well- 
read, and spoke French and German as well as he did 
English; but this accomplishment does not imply 
an exhaustive knowledge of those tongues. He was 
not literary, and had no desire to swell the host of 
aspirants who write for fame and find it famine. He 
had none of the traits of the business man. At the 
same time he was not a wine-bibber or a professional 
debauchee. He would have been in several respects 
an admirable young man, had he lost his father in¬ 
stead of his mother, for his mother was a sensible 
woman who would have governed her affection by 
reason, and who, even had she wished to do so, would 
not have had, to waste upon him, the wealth that so 
frequently ruins. His misfortune was that the wrong 
parent survived. If he had been asked to give his 
conception of life he would have been puzzled howto 
answer. Perhaps he would have replied that the 
c.hief end of man was to fall in love and enjoy it for- 




72 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


ever. He was not fond of those moral speculations 
which bothered Marmaduke. It is highly probable 
that to him the problem of existence would be solved 
in having a “good time,” no matter who else had an 
evil one. 

Dr. Billington’s hours for receiving patients were 
from nine in the morning until two in the afternoon. 
The moment the clock in his office, with cathedral 
chime, struck nine, he rang the little silver hand-bell 
which warned the colored boy in the waiting-room 
that the first patient was to be admitted. The instant 
that the hand was on the stroke of two, no one was 
allowed ingress from the outer world to the waiting- 
room, no matter how urgent the case. These were 
two of the doctor’s most imperative business habits, 
and from them he never swerved. He might, indeed, 
consent to attend a patient outside his office, when 
the regular hours were over, as he had, several times, 
in the case of Mrs. Orme; or even to vacate his con¬ 
sulting-room for a few days when summoned to a 
distinguished patient, or to a case of peculiar interest 
and importance at a distance. But these occasions 
were comparatively rare, and his fees for such attend¬ 
ance tyere usually so large, that few but the wealthy 
were willing to incur them. At the same time it is 
due to Dr. Billington to acknowledge that he made 
exceptions; that he was a laborer particularly worthy 
of his hire; and that he had a number of patients from 
whom he never took, and never wanted to take, a fee. 

One morning, in the latter part of May, the doctor 
was seated in his ofjfice as usual, leaning back in his 
richly carved chair, which resembled, in its majestic 
contour and elaborate detail, King Rudiger’s chair of 


DR. BILLINGTON VISITS MARMADUKE. 


73 


state. He was just on the point of dismissing one of 
those numerous patients the only reality of whose 
disease consisted in its imaginary character. The 
doctor smiled curiously to himself as the patient de¬ 
parted, and sank back musingly into his chair fora 
moment, as though seeking to grasp that secret of 
the brain-cells whereby that which has only a sub¬ 
jective existence is no less actual than the objective 
realities of which our senses inform us. He was just 
about to tap his bell for the next patient, when a 
knock that he recognized came at another door, open¬ 
ing on the main hall. 

“Come in,” said the doctor; and in another instant 
George entered, arrayed in that unconscious fault¬ 
lessness which is the test of a man who has made dress 
a fine-art and has ceased to be vain of his skill. 
George was neither handsome nor the reverse. The 
discontent of a satiated nature was expressed in nearly 
every feature, and a slight frown, which would de¬ 
velop into a scowl in middle-age, lined a brow that 
was still capable of smiling in good-humor. His dark 
hair and eyes were such as his father’s might have 
been in youth, and the disdainful curve of his mouth 
was a symbol of the cynicism he had inherited from 
the same source. 

“ I wanted to see you,” said George, “ and I couldn’t 
wait till two.” 

“ Sit down,” replied his father, motioning to a low, 
easy chair, facing him. It was the chair upon which 
those who came to consult him invariably sat, the cur¬ 
tains over a window at an angle with it, on the other 
side of the room, being so placed that whatever light 


74 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


there was outside penetrated the shaded chamber and 
fell full on the visitor’s countenance. 

“ Let the patients wait,” continued the doctor, re¬ 
garding his son’s features solicitously, as he always 
did. Not for another soul on earth would he have 
made this concession. Prompt and uninterrupted at¬ 
tention to his patients was another of his prime rules. 

“Have you read the morning papers?” asked 
George, in a husky voice, which his father noticed. 

“ Not yet.” 

“ Then you havn’t seen this ?” And George put into 
the doctor’s hands one of the great dailies, directing 
his observance to a small paragraph therein. The 
paragraph was under the head of “ Personal Men¬ 
tion,” and read as follows: 

“ It is not generally known that the Rev. Marma- 
duke Allan, rector of the Church of St. Remigius, 
has for some time been betrothed to Miss Beatrice 
Orrae. The marriage will probably take place some 
time in June.” 

“Preposterous!” exclaimed the doctor, handing 
back the paper. “ Not a word of truth in it!” 

“ But how do you know,” asked George huskily, as 
before, and with a touch of querulousness in his voice. 

“ How do I know ?” asked the doctor. “ How do I 
know, my dear boy ? Why don’t you know, as well as 
/do, that Marmaduke can’t marry? You know all 
about the will. It’s an old story.” 

“ But—but—” 

“ But what ?” 

“ Suppose—suppose he loves her,” said George, 
with a hesitation quite foreign to him, for he knew 


DR. BILLINGTON VISITS MARMADUKE. 


75 


the incredulity with which his father generally re¬ 
garded affairs of the heart. 

Dr. Billington laughed. It was a peculiar laugh, 
quite inaudible; but it convulsed his features into an 
arabesque of wrinkles, and shook his spare figure from 
the waist up. This silent laughter was horrible. It 
conveyed the impression that the doctor saw a gigan¬ 
tic comedy behind the hideous diseases on which his 
art was exercised, and that he was the sole spectator 
of the anguish-hidden farce. 

“Why do you laugh?” said the son, irritated. 
“Don’t you see that it is killing me ?” 

The doctor’s manner changed instantly. His pro¬ 
fessional gravity returned. He looked at his son 
more scrutinizingly than before, and instinctively— 
it may almost be said mechanically—felt his pulse. 
Then, disguising whatever concern he felt, he said: 

“ Soon set you up again. A change of air is what 
you need.” 

“And that’s the last thing I will take,” answered 
George, the blood mounting to his face. “For I 
should have to leave New York.” 

“ Well, dear child. You have often left it before.” 

“But now— now,” rejoined the young man excited¬ 
ly, “I must remain. Great heaven!” he continued, 
rising in agitation, and pacing up and down the room, 
“can’t you guess,Can’t you see,you who know every¬ 
thing, and can almost read a man’s thoughts that 
you have seen for the first time—can’t you understand 
that I wouldn’t have shown you this paragraph un¬ 
less,—” and without completing the sentence he sat 
down at the opposite side of the desk, and tapping 
the paragraph with his finger, exclaimed excitedly: 


76 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


“ I love her, too !” 

Dr. Billington had experienced a great many sur¬ 
prises in his professional career, so many indeed that 
he was apt to felicitate himself upon being now be¬ 
yond reach of astonishment. But at this avowal he 
started, his brow gathered, and for a moment he could 
only exclaim: 

“You! You!” 

Then, calming himself, he asked in his usual tone: 

“ How did it happen ?” 

“ Three weeks ago I went to an afternoon reception 
given by Mrs. Todhunter.” 

“You ?” inquired his father, a whimsical expression 
stealing into his eyes. “You at an afternoon recep¬ 
tion ? You astonish me. I thought you never went 
to such affairs. I thought you hated them.” 

“ So I do. I don’t know why I went. Fate I sup¬ 
pose. Mrs. Todhunter’s daughter is a bud. She 
was introducing her to society. I am rather fond of 
buds. However, I went. There I was introduced to 
Mrs. and Miss Orme. Perhaps you’ve heard of Mrs. 
Orme ? There! Don’t interrupt me. She belongs 
to a distinguished Philadelphia family, and looks as 
if she’d had a history. Miss Orme is perfection. Her 
name is Beatrice. You know I’ve never been in love 
—not really in love. The other things don’t count. 
Miss Orme did the business for me. I used to laugh 
at the fellows who talked about love—that is the fel¬ 
lows who really knew what it was. I didn’t know 
then. I do now. Oh! she has such eyes, such hair, 
such a mouth, such a manner. I asked leave to call. 
It was granted. But what could I do—what headway 
could I have made, at the best, in three short weeks? 


DR. BILLINGTON VISITS MARMADUKE. 


77 


I only had time to see that she was lovelier than I 
ever thought any woman could be, and that they are 
ladies—ladies both, to the tips of their fingers. I 
happened to call when Marmaduke was not there, or 
perhaps I might have suspected something. As it 
was, I didn’t suspect anything—not even last Sunday 
when I happened to see them in the street together 
coming from church. And now, just as I thought I 
could begin to call oftener, and that she would get to 
like me, and afterwards to—to love me—I come across 
this infernal paragraph. That man has got everything. 
He’s got money enough to gratify every wish of his 
heart. He beat me at everything when we were boys 
together. And now he wants to take this girl from 
me, that he’s got no right to and shan’t have. I tell 
you he shall not have Beatrice Orme. I would shoot 
him or her, rather.” 

These words, blurted out with the indignant peev¬ 
ishness of a spoiled child, greatly impressed the 
doctor. He knew his son sufficiently to see that he 
was suffering deeply, and that the emotion he ex¬ 
pressed was the result of no ordinary whim. But he 
merely played contemplatively with his prodigious 
ivory paper cutter, as he replied quietly: 

“ I see no reason why you should not marry Miss 
Orme.” 

“ Father !” exclaimed the young man. 

“I see no reason why you should not marry Miss 
Orme,” repeated the doctor, nodding his head slowly 
and cheerily. “ It is impossible that Marmaduke 
should be engaged to her. No man who is not a fool 
or insane would sacrifice his income for—for a wo¬ 
man.” 


78 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


“ I would—for that woman.” 

“ Ah! but you see for the present you come under 
one of those categories, for you are in love—or think 
so.” 

“ And Marmaduke ! Isn’t he in love ?” 

“ No,” answered the doctor, with a wise shake of 
the head. “ His temperament is cold; yours is warm. 
He has been protected all his life from falling in love 
—at least that kind of love which has marriage in 
view—by the knowledge that if he did he would be¬ 
come a pauper. And even if he should be such an 
ass as to have engaged himself to Miss Orme, it must 
be because, from some curious accident, both she and 
her mother are ignorant of the terms of his father’s 
will. Do you suppose, when they know the truth, 
that they will not back out ? They will, as sure as 
my name is Erasmus Billington. And if they don’t, 
he will. Do you suppose for an instant that a man 
who has hundreds of thousands at his disposal, can 
support a wife and family on fifteen hundred a year? 
That is all St. Remigius gives him. But there, I’m 
talking like a fool. I tell you there is no engage¬ 
ment, and can be none. Marmaduke is too fond of 
purple and fine linen for that. That paragraph is 
merely a reporter’s lie, put in to make people talk.” 

“You really think so?” 

“ I’ll stake my professional reputation on it, and 
burn my diplomas if it isn’t.” 

This was a favorite wager and threat of Dr. Bil- 
lington’s, but it produced the intended effect upon 
his son. 

“ That’s right,” said his father. “ Keep a stiff upper 


DR. BILLINGTON VISITS MARMADUKE. 


79 


lip. Let me feel your pulse again. Ah ! Better ! 
Really, I begin to believe in mental healing myself.” 

The young man had risen. He looked a trifle 
brighter, but hesitated. 

“There’s one thing I wish you’d do,” he said. 
“ Nothing like making assurance doubly sure. Can’t 
you call on Marmaduke this afternoon, when you go 
out driving? Can’t you call upon him and ask 
him whether this thing is true ? It will come with 
a good grace from you. You were his guardian. 
You have a right to be interested in him and to ask 
him such a question. Besides, he will tell you the truth 
—I give him credit for that—and that will settle the 
question one way or the other.” 

The doctor smiled at the wiliness of his son, and 
sighed, even while he smiled, at the depth of feeling 
it betrayed. 

“Yes, I will go,” he answered, “since you wish it. 
Leave me the paper. It must seem as if I got my in¬ 
formation directly from it. You must not appear in 
it at all. Meanwhile, be careful. Let no one, especi¬ 
ally Marmaduke, know your feeling toward Miss 
Orme. Nothing can be gained by betraying it before 
the proper times comes, and everything may be lost.” 
And giving George a reassuring grasp of the hand, 
he sent him away, comforted a little, and rang the 
bell for the next in turn of his long-suffering patients. 

That afternoon, upon getting into his barouche in 
order to take his accustomed drive round the park, 
Dr. Billington ordered his coachman to proceed first 
to the unaristocratic quarters where the rectory ad¬ 
joining the Church of St. Remigius was situated. 
Arriving there, he found, to his gratification, that the 


8o 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


young clergyman was at home, and in another mo¬ 
ment, Marmaduke, concealing his surprise at the visit, 
almost the first the doctor had ever paid him, issued 
from his study and led him back to it with that 
warmth of welcome he knew so well how to give. 

“ Surprised to see me!” exclaimed the doctor glanc¬ 
ing quizzically at his whilom ward, after they were 
seated. “ Suprised to see me, but too polite to show it. 
Don’t say a word,” as Marmaduke attempted a cour¬ 
teous demurrer. “ Of course I come with an object. 
It would be useless to deny that. So I will go at 
once to the point. Tell me, is this true ?” And he 
handed Marmaduke the paper which he had taken 
from his son, indicating the paragraph as George had 
done. 

Marmaduke reddened slightly as he read the words. 
Possibly because he shrank from the discussion which 
he knew would ensue, and anticipated the arguments 
which his former guardian would have the right to 
present. 

“Yes, it is quite true,” he answered, in a low voice, 
handing the paper back. “ It is quite true, with the 
exception of the last sentence. The date of the mar¬ 
riage has not yet been fixed.” 

The doctor sat staring at him like a man suddenly 
deprived of breath. He had sometimes given pre¬ 
scriptions which had failed utterly, producing an 
effect entirely different from the one intended. But 
he was never so completely nonplussed as at this 
moment when he saw before him a young man, 
almost in the very morning of youth, who was going 
to throw away a large fortune,—for what ? For that 
Will-o’-the-wisp, called love. At the same time, while 


DR. BILLINGTON VISITS MARMADUKE. 


8l 


he failed to appreciate the depth of Marmaduke’s 
emotion, the misery of his own son assumed gigan¬ 
tic proportions. It was this that paralyzed him for 
a moment and prevented his expressing himself with 
the energy he would have liked to have at hand. He 
could only gasp out, in a voice of the feebleness of 
which he was conscious : 

“ What are you going to live on ?” 

Unanswerable question. At the moment when Dr. 
Billington drove up to the door, Marmaduke, in the 
quiet and seclusion of his study (it was in the rear 
of the house, and opened upon a high-walled little 
garden wherein a fountain played), was wondering 
when the bishop’s answer would arrive. That answer 
obtained, the next step would be for him to resign 
his pastorate. His action would become known to 
the world, and the only means of making a living 
with which he was familiar would no longer exist. 

“ What are you going to live on ? ” repeated the 
doctor, this time in his usual somewhat peremptory 
tone. 

“Oh, a way will come,” answered Marmaduke, 
forcing a smile, and assuming a happy confidence he 
was far from feeling. “ I am young. I am strong. 
I am not altogether without brains. I shall not 
always be in the receipt of a salary of only fifteen 
hundred.” 

“ Oh ! you think the Lord will provide ? ” 

“ I think that perhaps the Lord will permit me to 
provide for myself,” answered Marmaduke, adopting 
something of the sarcasm perceptible in the doctor’s 
manner. “ I do not think there is any grudge 


82 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


against me in that quarter, and I believe I shall be 
allowed a fair chance in the competition of the world.” 

The doctor rose. He did not see much use in pro¬ 
longing the interview just at that time after the defi¬ 
nite information he had received. Besides, he w r as 
too ruffled to be entirely self-possessed. 

“ Marmaduke,” he said, “ I will not apply to you 
the words which would accurately describe your con¬ 
duct. They might be considered offensive in your 
own house. I have some privileges, however, as your 
former guardian. You will allow me to ask a ques¬ 
tion. Do you mean to tell me that this lady, Miss 
Orme, and her mother, clearly understand that the 
moment you marry, your fortune disappears like mist 
before the sun ?” 

Marmaduke briefly explained what we have already 
narrated on that head. 

“ Marvellous ! ” exclaimed the doctor. “ Marvel¬ 
lous ! I thought I knew something of human nature, 
but it appears that my thirty-five years of practice 
have been thrown away. I came here fully prepared 
to find this rumor a mere canard. Had I found that 
there was merely a grain of truth in it, I would have 
argued with you—pleaded with you, even—for your 
own sake ; for you must see that I am totally disin¬ 
terested. But since you tell me with your own lips 
that the entire thing is settled, I have i. )thing more, 
just at present, to say.” He paused a moment, then 
added : “ Nothing excepting this : that it is impos¬ 
sible ; it cannot be ; either the girl will withdraw at 
the last moment, or you will. What ! Sacrifice a 
fortune for a face ! What madness ! ” 

“ Madness,” said Marmaduke, detaining the doctor 


DR. BILLINGTON VISITS MARMADUKE. 


83 


"by a certain stridency of voice, which that gentleman 
had never heard in him before, “madness to you, 
because, though you have dissected the human heart 
a hundred times, you never found anything in it 
which you could touch with your scalpel and label 
‘ love.’ What you could not see with your physical 
eye you did not believe in ; just as Lalande, the 
astronomer, sweeping the firmament with his tele¬ 
scope, declared there was no God because he could 
not detect Him with the lens.” 

He started at his own words. This argument, that 
came so pat, uttered in the spontaneity of the 
moment, was like the return-wave of that religious 
faith from which he had escaped. The doctor looked 
at him in surprise for an instant, for he had seldom 
seen him with flushed, indignant face. Then he said : 
“Stuff ! Stuff ! ” in his most pompous manner, and 
leaving the study got into his carriage and drove 
rapidly to the Park. 

That evening, after dinner, as the doctor sat alone 
in his study, reading one of the current novels, as he 
was in the habit of doing, in order, as he explained, 
to relax the bow from its too pathologic bent, a 
knock, the spirited accent of which he instantly recog¬ 
nized, came to the door, and George entered, with a 
look of pallid anxiety. The young man seldom took 
thought of what would please or displease his father, 
but there was one point upon which the old gentle¬ 
man was apt to be restive, and that was being dis¬ 
turbed at dinner, especially by anything unpleasant. 
He liked to eat a good dinner leisurely, for he be¬ 
lieved that longlife was founded upon perfect diges¬ 
tion, and he desired to have a long life. That even- 


8 4 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


ing he had dined alone, George, as was so often the 
case, dining at his club—dining perfunctorily, that 
is, for he had eaten scarcely a mouthful. As soon as 
he deemed prudent he almost ran to his father’s 
house, trembling with anxiety to learn his fate. 

We said that Dr. Billington had been reading ; but 
in truth it was merely an attempt to read ; for he 
was much perturbed. Several times he had laid the 
book down, and leaning his face on his hands had 
thought long and deeply, lost to all surrounding 
objects. It was from this attitude he roused himself 
when George’s knock came, but not until it had been 
repeated. 

“ Were you asleep ?” asked George, with a touch 
of irritation. 

“ No, not asleep ; only thinking.” 

“Well, why don’t you tell me?” with increasing 
irritation. “ Is it all up ? Are they engaged ? ” 

“ They are engaged.” 

The young man uttered something between a groan 
and an imprecation, and sank on the low chair he had 
occupied in the morning. 

“ They are engaged,” repeated the doctor, gazing 
at his son with a look of gentle compassion, which 
softened wonderfully his acute and satirical features. 
“But it is not necessarily all up. Cut him out.” 

The son laughed, in discordant mockery. 

“ I am not such a fool as to try that. Do you sup¬ 
pose that a girl who loves a man enough to marry 
him, though she knows he will have no more salary 
to begin with than a clerk—do you think that a girl 
who can love like that, can so easily be made to 
change her mind ? I never got anything in all my 


DR. BILLINGTON VISITS MARMADUKE. 85 

life that I wanted ; and now this, that I would give 
my life for, I cannot get.” 

This ungracious speech, so full of the character¬ 
istic exaggeration and ingratitude of youth, the 
father listened to with a deep sigh. Again the 
troubled and serious expression spread over his face, 
which had so frequently appeared there before 
George’s entrance. He closed the book with a snap, 
and laid it upon the desk. 

“ Do you mean to say that this is so very serious, 
that you must either make this girl your wife, or that 
you must be wretched for life?” 

“That is just what it is,” answered George, his 
countenance altered, and even somewhat exalted, by 
the look of suffering that had deepened there. 

“ I had been thinking, before you came in,” said 
the old man, “ that I owe it to Marmaduke’s father 
that his son’s marriage should not take place.” 

“ But how can it be prevented ?” 

“ There is a way.” 

“ And that ?” 

The old man gazed at his son, as though trying to 
weigh him, mentally and morally, with an approach 
to that impartiality which he had never yet been 
able to apply. Finally he gave it up, as though con¬ 
scious of his incapacity and,said : 

“ His father confided wholly in me ; told me fam¬ 
ily secrets—such as are seldom told except to the 
family physician.” 

“ But what has that to do with the present case ?” 

The doctor mused a moment, and then said : 

“ Marmaduke’s father was an eccentric man. He 
had reasons, perfectly satisfactory to himself, why 


86 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


Marmaduke should never marry. If he had not had 
them, he never would have made such a will, for in 
spite of his eccentricities he had plenty of common- 
sense. Marmaduke ought not to marry. He must 
not marry. He shall not marry.” 

George remained staring at his father, as one 
might stare at an oracle who utters ambiguities. 

“ But how, I ask, can it be prevented ? Why did 
you not tell him this when you saw him to-day?” 

“ My son, everything cannot be done at once. We 
sometimes use the expectant treatment in dealing 
with affairs, just as we do in dealing with diseases. 
It is wise, sometimes, to do nothing, until we are 
compelled to take up our last resource. Both the 
expected and the unexpected are constantly happen¬ 
ing. It is that which renders prediction, as a rule, 
absurd. The date of Marmaduke’s marriage is not 
yet fixed. At any rate it is not to take place in June. 
Suppose—suppose, for instance—he should die—” 

“ Die? We can’t count on that.” 

“ Of course not. But something just as fortunate 
for you may happen. It is my duty as the executor 
of Mr. Allan’s will, it is my duty as having been his 
intimate friend and family physician, it is my duty 
as the former guardian of his son, to make it as cer¬ 
tain as certainty can be that Marmaduke shall never 
marry. The motives which may lead a man to make 
a peculiar will are not necessarily expressed in that 
will. They were not expressed in Mr. Allan’s. But 
they may have been clearly revealed to some one else 
—to his executor, for instance.” 

“ Well—well ! Go on !” exclaimed George, impa¬ 
tiently, as his father came to a sudden stop. 


DR. BILLINGTON VISITS MARMADUKE. 


8 7 


“ As I said before,” continued the old man, “it is 
often necessary to keep your unanswerable argument 
in the background until all others have been tried in 
vain. I will see Marmaduke again. I will show him, 
as plainly as possible, that to marry this girl is to im¬ 
pair, in fact, almost to kill, his usefulness in the min¬ 
istry. He loses all chance of doing the good he can 
do—or fancies he can do—with so much wealth, and 
he cripples his opportunity of advancement; for it is 
all nonsense to say that a rich clergyman is not a 
much more potent factor than a poor one. Bishops 
are fond of Macsenas. If these arguments fail—but, 
of course, they won’t fail.” 

“ But if they do ?” 

“ Why then, there is another one, painful though 
it may be. My dear child, you will make me ill, my¬ 
self, with that distracted face of yours. Cheer up. 
Go and amuse yourself. I cannot promise you that 
you shall ultimately be Miss Orme’s husband. That 
must depend upon yourself and her. But I am 
pretty sure that I can promise you that she will 
never marry Marmaduke.” 

“ Father! Say that you are certain.” The young 
man had sprung up and clasped his father by the 
hand. 

“ Well, then,” said the old man, returning the 
pressure, and looking at him very seriously, “I will 
say that I am certain.” 

“ When will you see him ?” 

“To-morrow evening.” 

“ Where ?” 

“ Here.” 

“ He will be with Beatrice.” 


88 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


“ No. He will be with me.” 

“ How can you tell that ?” 

The doctor turned away and wrote a few lines on 
a sheet of note-paper. This he inclosed in an envel¬ 
ope upon which he wrote “Rev. Marmaduke Allan,” 
with the address. 

“ Mail this as you go out,” he said, handing it to 
his son. 


MARMADUKE VISITS DR. BILLINGTON. 89 


CHAPTER V. 

MARMADUKE VISITS DR. BILLINGTON. 

Early the next morning when Marmaduke was al¬ 
ready in his study, this note was delivered. He took 
it with impatience, feeling certain that it was from 
the bishop, and was both amazed and disappointed 
to recognize Dr. Billington’s hand. The note read 
as follows : 

Dear Marmaduke: As you are a young man and 
I am an old one, I will ask you to call upon me at 
eight o’clock to-morrow evening. It is necessary 
that I should see you on business of the utmost im¬ 
portance, in which your deepest interests are vi¬ 
tally concerned. Yours sincerely, 

Erasmus Billington. 

For some instants after reading this note, Marma¬ 
duke held it open before him in extreme astonish¬ 
ment. What could be the business of utmost im¬ 
portance upon which the doctor desired to see him ? 
In what were his deepest interests vitally concerned, 
that he was not perfectly aware of already ? What 
could possibly have occurred between yesterday 
afternoon and yesterday evening, which could make 
it incumbent upon the doctor to write this remark¬ 
able missive? Why had he not mentioned or hinted 
at this subject during his visit? Could it be that 


9 o 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


feeling still that something of the authority and re¬ 
sponsibility of the guardian attached to him, the old 
physician was anxious to fulfil his duties—miscon¬ 
ceived as they might be—with the last degree of con¬ 
scientiousness ? Did he wish still to remonstrate 
with him about this marriage, and endeavor, by 
w r orldly and specious arguments, to persuade him to 
keep the fortune he was about to relinquish ? If so, 
how futile would be another interview. 

Marmaduke pondered long, willing to give the 
doctor credit for all the rectitude and kindly wisdom 
which he had evinced since he had first become his 
childhood’s guardian. There was no act of gross in¬ 
justice or cruelty of which he could accuse him. The 
only defects he could lay to his charge were the cold¬ 
ness one shows to one’s neighbor’s child when occu¬ 
pied with one’s own, and the partiality by which he 
had made the difference between his feelings for 
George and his feelings for Marmaduke apparent to 
the world. The young clergyman was forced to 
yield a certain respect to the doctor’s character, in 
spite of its sinister element. He had expected to 
spend that evening with Beatrice; but he found 
himself forced to write two notes: one to Beatrice to 
inform her of the impossibility of keeping his ap¬ 
pointment, and one to the doctor stating that he 
would be at his house at the hour specified. 

It will readily be believed that Marmaduke was 
not in the best of tempers when night came and he 
found himself punctually at the doctor’s door. He 
was shown at once to the study, which was also the li¬ 
brary, a large square apartment illumined by day only 
by the solitary streak of light already mentioned, and 


MARMADUKE VISITS DR. BII.LINGTON. 


91 


by night only by a green-shaded Argand burner, 
which, raised or lowered at will, generally cast a ton- 
sure of radiance upon the centre of the desk, sur¬ 
rounded by mysterious shade and shadow. To reach 
this chamber from the waiting-room one had to tra¬ 
verse a long and narrow passage, which ran nearly 
the whole length of the house. It was through this 
passage, that Marmaduke, by some mistake of the 
servant, who was new, made his way now. In his 
excited and slightly morbid state, a shudder came 
over him as he reflected how many hundred beings, 
during the last thirty years, must have trodden that 
passage to learn from the doctor words of salvation 
or of doom. How many racked souls verging upon 
madness, or already caught within its coils, had 
waited desperately in the little reception-room, scarce¬ 
ly able to totter into the presence of the ^Esculapius 
who sat indifferently awaiting them, and then going 
forth possibly to hope and health, possibly to despair 
and death. 

He found Dr. Billington, as usual, reading the 
latest novel, which had attained a wonderful popular¬ 
ity because Bismarck had stated in a published letter 
that he had sat up all night to finish it. But the 
doctor’s brow was somewhat corrugated, and his air 
was a trifle wearied. Truth to tell, though quite un¬ 
accustomed to taking medicine (it was his profession 
to give it), he had just before Marmaduke’s arrival, 
swallowed a table-spoonful of liquid coca, expressed 
by himself from fresh leaves, newly imported. He 
had felt that he needed the bracing qualities of the 
extract, for the business that lay before him required 
as much firmness as tact. 


92 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


“ You are very good to come so far,” said the doc¬ 
tor motioning Marmaduke to the low chair, his voice 
wearing that slightly sarcastic timbre which k was 
seldom entirely without. “ And yet I would not have 
’ asked you, had it not been very important.” 

So saying he arose and shut the door, opening into 
the narrow passage, which Marmaduke had found 
slightly ajar, and cast a keen glance at the other por¬ 
tals, as if to make sure that they also were tightly 
closed. As Marmaduke watched these proceedings 
a vague disquiet, of which he could give no explana¬ 
tion, gathered at his heart, and for an instant, weak¬ 
ened by many months of mental and moral strain, he 
underwent that sinking of the spirit experienced by 
so many of those who had occupied that chair. 

“ I acknowledge,” continued the doctor, resuming 
his seat, and playing with his immense and elabor¬ 
ately-carved paper-cutter, as he frequently did when 
approaching questions of importance, “ I acknowledge 
that yesterday afternoon I treated your communica¬ 
tion with a roughness that did not comport with the 
interest I really felt.” 

Marmaduke smiled slightly and made that gesture 
of the hand which waives further consideration of 
forgotten trifles. 

“ On your part, you will acknowledge,” said the 
doctor in a tone of unwonted kindness, “ that my in¬ 
terest was natural. I have not got what is generally 
' called an affectionate nature. But I knew your father 
and mother. I was their most intimate friend. I 
was responsible for you from your youth up ; and I 
could not, I really could not, see you throw away a 
future of such large dimensions without feeling a 


MARMADUKE VISITS DR. BILLINGTON. 


93 


deep concern. I was amazed and stunned. At the 
moment I was too excited to treat the matter with 
the calmness it demanded. You will, therefore, for¬ 
get my hasty words ?” 

Again Marmaduke slightly smiled and bowed. 

“ Let us dismiss the subject,” he answered. “ You 
also, I trust, will forget my unseemly reply.” 

“ The reply was natural. The only hesitation I 
have in approaching the theme again is because I fear 
that if I use the same arguments, you will, from the 
very nature of your feelings, give me substantially 
the same reply ?” 

They looked steadily at each other for a few mo¬ 
ments. A shade of vexation passed over Marmaduke’s 
face. 

“Yes,” he answered finally, “you are right. The 
reply would have to be substantially the same.” 

“ Look at me,” responded the doctor. “ I am old. 
I have made a great deal of money. People say that 
I am fond of money—and so I am. But 1 would 
gladly give away a third of what I have made by 
years of toil, if you would give me your word of 
honor that you will never marry.” He was about to 
add “ Miss Orme,” but checked himself suddenly, 
and concluded the sentence as we have put it. 

“ To what does all this lead ?” exclaimed the young 
man, with suppressed impatience. “You have done 
your duty by me, doctor, and now you are doing 
more than your duty. I appreciate your disinterest¬ 
edness and your conscientiousness, and I thank you 
warmly. But the thing is decided. If I ruin myself 
in the eyes of the world it is to win a rich reward 
that will more than compensate the ruin. You ask 


94 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


me to recede from my engagement to Miss Orme. 
You might as well ask the Christian to give up his 
hope of heaven. Is there any motive conceivable 
that would be powerful enough to make me recede ? 
Nothing, excepting her own wish—and not even that, 
for that is not conceivable. Love like ours is not 
such an ordinary thing that it can be snapped like a 
thread, and no harm done. What you suggest is im¬ 
possible. I beg of you not to refer to it again.” 

The doctor sighed and drew a deep breath. 

“ I will not dwell any longer upon that point,” he 
resumed, “ sin'ce you tell me the thing is irrevocable, 
but I will now approach another. Tell me : you are 
a man who thinks much, and you have thought be¬ 
yond your years. Has it never, then, occurred to 
you that your father had peculiar reasons for making 
the will he did ?” 

“ Oh, yes. It has come to me from one or two 
sources, unremembered now—I think you once told 
me so yourself—that my father’s married life was not 
an entirely happy one ; that he possessed uncommon 
eccentricities that my mother opposed ; and that after 
her death he became a recluse, a misanthrope ; and 
that one of his whims was that I, his only child, 
should have no share in perpetuating the family 
name. These, I suppose, were his reasons. They 
are enough.” 

“ Enough, but not all.” 

“ Not all ?” Marmaduke looked up with a wonder¬ 
ing and anxious expression. 

“ No. One reason remains, which is stronger than 
all the rest.” 

“ And why have you not told it me before,” asked 


MARMADUKE VISITS DR. BILLINGTON. 


95 


Marmaduke, his heart fluttering as that vague and 
nameless apprehension returned to it. 

“Because I hoped the occasion might never come. 
Not one young man in ten million, situated as you 
are, would dream of marriage. And since you speak 
of love, and imply that to me it is an unkown quantity, 
need I remind you that it as easy to love without 
marrying, as it is to marry without love ?” 

Marmaduke raised his hands with silencing gesture. 

“I know all you would say on that head. I do not 
profess to have been immaculate. I know what the 
passions are. And I know that if we do not curb 
them they will kill us. Therefore we may dismiss 
that subject. But you speak of another reason, a 
reason so powerful—” he paused, hardly knowing 
how to carry the sentence to its logical conclusion. 

“ A reason so powerful,” said the doctor, “ that it 
will prove to you, conclusively, that your father was 
in the right.” 

“ In the right ?” exclaimed Marmaduke, his face 
flushing. “ Do you mean to tell me, then, that the 
reason is so powerful that this marriage cannot take 
place ?” 

The doctor nodded his head slowly and solemnly. 

“That is precisely what I mean, Marmaduke.” 

The young man leaned his head back against the 
chair and smiled that delightful smile of complacency 
and assurance which youth alone is apt to wear. 

“ Really, you must excuse my laughing,” he ex¬ 
claimed. “ I am acting better than a good many sons 
would act, for I do not contest the will, and never 
thought of contesting it, until a busybody in my con¬ 
gregation one day suggested it. I esteem my father 


9 6 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


just as much as a son can esteem any father so unjust; 
but when you tell me that behind all his known ec¬ 
centricities there is still another, which you have kept 
hidden until now, and which is to induce me to break 
faith with Miss Orme, and live and die a bachelor— 
doctor, I have to smile, because it is so absurd.” 

The doctor gazed at him with a pitying glance. 
Occasionally, in spite of the professional apathy that 
had grown upon him, he had so gazed at patients 
who, in the flower of youth or in the prime of man¬ 
hood, were gaily unconscious of the impending fatal¬ 
ities lurking in their disordered nerves, and played, 
as it were, with the thread supporting the scimitar 
suspended above their heads. 

“ You do not remember your mother?” 

This sentence, said in a tone into which a peculiar¬ 
ity of meaning inserted itself, fell like ice upon Mar- 
maduke’s gaiety, which had indeed been partly a 
reaction from his previous tension. 

“ My mother?” he repeated abstractedly. 

“ You will have at least one advantage in your 
marriage. For you have the opportunity of becom¬ 
ing perfectly acquainted with Miss Orme’s ante¬ 
cedents.” 

“ Her antecedents ?” repeated Marmaduke as before, 
unable to perceive what the doctor was driving at. 

“ That is always desirable. Your father fell in love 
with your mother at first sight. They were married 
almost immediately. He knew nothing.” 

“ For heaven’s sake, what was there to know ?” 
shouted the young man, half rising. 

“Almost everything. Don’t get excited. Fortu¬ 
nately she came of a good family—I meant no insinu- 


MARMADUKE VISITS DR. BILLINGTON. 


97 


ations to the contrary. But there was very little left 
of it, for she was almost the only surviving member 
beyond a few remote connections with whom your 
father never cared to become acquainted, much less 
establish an intercourse. You may feel perfectly sure 
that that is the only reason why you have never been 
pestered with envious second cousins trying to en- 
veigle you into a marriage from no other motive than, 
since they got none of your father’s wealth, you 
should enjoy none either. No: your father had 
nothing to regret as far as the entire reputability 
of the little he could afterwards learn of your moth¬ 
er’s fatnily was concerned. Your mother,” he paused 
and looked keenly at the young man, who was listen¬ 
ing to him with rapt attention, “ your mother was 
even more eccentric than your father; and you know 
there is a limit beyond which eccentricity ceases to 
be sanity. Your mother—” 

“ No, no,” cried Marmaduke, the blood leaving his 
face as hope leaves a man who mounts the gallows. 
“ You do not mean to tell me that my mother was 
insane.” 

“ Your mother was insane,” said the doctor in a 
voice which had now grown pitiless because of the 
strong effort he himself made to remain calm. “ More 
than that. Her insanity manifested itself before your 
birth and after it. She died a raving lunatic.” 

He had brought matters to a speedy climax at last. 
Suddenly he stopped, appalled at the spectacle of 
anguish which he had felt himself compelled to bring 
about. Marmaduke sat motionless, his eyes so fixed 
upon the doctor that they may be said to have lost 
all expression. He opened his mouth twice in the 


9 8 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


vain endeavor to speak. Then he stammered out, in 
a voice no longer his: 

“You say—she died—a raving—lunatic?” 

The doctor bowed his head. 

“ Your father and mother were travelling. I was 
with them, partly as physician, partly as friend. Luck¬ 
ily we were in a very secluded place at the time—in 
Russia, on the outskirts of St. Petersburg—where all 
the horrible scenes that occurred could be prevented 
from becoming matter of gossip. It was there that 
your poor mother developed into a violent maniac of 
the worst type.” 

“No! No! It cannot be !” 

The words were not uttered in a tone of impreca¬ 
tion or violence, but as one might voice a protest 
against some potent argument, the sophistry of which 
he felt he could not detect. 

“ It is but too true,” continued the doctor. “ In 
her paroxysms her own life and the lives of all around 
her were in danger. In the midst of one of the worst 
of these paroxysms you were born.” 

The two men had continued looking steadily at 
each other, but the doctor had not foreseen the effect 
of his last words. As all the sweetest and brightest 
hopes of his life were thus torn up with one black 
wrench, Marmaduke burst into one of those frightful 
fits of laughter, interspersed with tempests of tears, 
which show that the fountains of the spirit’s deep are 
broken up, and the soul is rent as by an earthquake. 
No one could emerge from such agony as that and be 
precisely the same man as before. The whole nature 
was convulsed. The temperament and character 
were shaken as the sea is cloven by the cyclone or 


MARMADUKE VISITS DR. BILLINGTON. 


99 


the desert ploughed by the simootn. For a few 
moments nothing was heard in the apartment save 
this awful laughter with its undercurrent of sobs— 
laughter such as a spirit might utter cast out forever 
from the heaven to which it had no claim; sobs such 
as might have issued from it when it found there was 
no place for repentance though sought eagerly and 
with tears. The doctor hastily poured a powder into 
a glass of wine, which he implored Marmaduke to 
swallow. The young man dashed it aside. The 
costly crystal fell, shattered, on the floor. He passed 
his damp hand over his brow in wandering wonder. 
The first fierce caress of suffering was over for the 
time, and he grew calmer. 

“ Now tell me the rest,” he said. 

“ There is little more to tell,” answered the doctor, 
his voice growing softer, for he was not without feel¬ 
ing something of the pang which the exigencies of 
the case had called upon him to inflict. “ Now you 
see why your father desired that you should never 
marry. On investigation it was discovered that mad¬ 
ness had been in your mother’s family for generations, 
occasionally skipping one generation only to appear 
in a more virulent form in the next. This made your 
father solicitous that no descendant of his should live 
to perpetuate such a race. You are its last lineal 
representative.” 

“ I understand it all. I understand it all.” The 
words were uttered in the voice of one who had been 
compelled to look upon unspeakable mysteries, which 
had warped the texture of his soul and changed the 
current of his life. 

“ And what guarantee have I,” asked Marmaduke, 


100 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


“ that I at last may not succumb to this frightful 
malady ?” 

“ There, Marmaduke, you ask me the most painful 
question of all. And I am compelled to answer you 
frankly. You have no absolute guarantee. The 
hopeful side is that you have reached.your present 
age without the tendency becoming manifest.” 

“ But have any of my mother’s ancestors, so far as 
you know, become victims of it after having passed 
my age?” 

The doctor was silent for a moment. Then came 
one word which closed the door of hope. 

“ Yes.” 

Again dead silence when neither of them could be 
heard to breathe. The silence became so painful at 
last—it was like that darkness which can be felt— 
that presently the doctor said: 

“ Now, my dear Marmaduke, you see why your 
marriage is impossible. It is within the bounds of 
possibility that you may weather the threatened 
storm; it is even possible that the storm itself may 
never come; but would you, could you, as an honest 
man—I will not say as a minister of the Gospel—de¬ 
sire to become the father of a child before whom such 
a fearful fate,—” 

A pleading touch was laid upon his arm. 

“ Don’t! Don’t! If what you say be true,—” 

“ If?” said the doctor with quiet emphasis. 

He rose and going to a small desk made of teak- 
wood, curiously carved, unlocked it; searched for a 
little amid its dusty pigeon-holes, and presently 
brought forth a faded letter. With this he came 
back to his desk, and unfolding the missive with 


MARMADUKE VISITS DR. BILLINGTON. 


IOI 


careful touch, handed it to Marmaduke. The latter, 
calm now, even calmer than his wont, took the yellow 
sheet, and holding it open, read as follows: 

January, 1851. 

My dear Friend: —As you know perfectly well the 
provisions of my will, I write these few lines to you 
only in order that, if the necessity should ever arise, 
you may show them to my son, that he may have ir¬ 
refragable evidence of the excellence of my motives 
in making it certain that he will remain single. The 
presence of madness for generations in the family of 
his most unhappy mother, puts it beyond a doubt 
that the same inheritance will come either to him— 
or to his children, should he marry. If, in spite of 
the precautions I have taken, he should, unfortunate¬ 
ly, fall in love, purpose marrying, and should not 
have the wisdom, the manliness, the humanity, after 
reading this letter, to crush that love, and refrain 
from marriage, even though it should break his 
heart, no other consideration that could be presented 
to him would avail, even though I should return from 
the grave to remonstrate. Show him this as a last re¬ 
source. 

Your sincere friend, 

Joseph Allan. 

To Dr. Erasmus Billington. 

As Marmaduke gazed at this document, like a stone 
image to which sight was granted, he recognized his 
father’s crooked and eccentric handwriting, as he 
had often seen it in old letters, even to the little 
twist at the end of the “ h,” which was one of the 
characteristics of the quaint and bold signature—even 
to the one large blot, without which his father could 
seldom finish the briefest note. 

Marmaduke folded the missive, and instead of re- 


102 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


turning it to the doctor, who waited with outstretched 
hand, placed it in an inside pocket of his coat saying: 

“ I will keep this, with your permission. I would 
like to have it always near me, always within reach, 
to fortify my resolution whenever it begins to fail. 
Oh ! my life, my life ! My ruined life !” 

He hid his face in his hands and sat thus leaning 
against the edge of the desk. An unaccustomed ex¬ 
pression stole over the doctor’s face. Was it pity ? 
Was it compassion? Or was it fear—he who had 
never known what fear was—lest the calamity which 
threatened his visitor might be closer at hand than 
he supposed ? He got up, and going to the cabinet, 
closed it vrith a soft, clicking noise, locked it and put 
the key in his pocket. When he reached his desk 
again his face had resumed its usual tranquility. 

“ Why did you not tell me all this when I was a 
boy ?” asked Marmaduke. 

“ I dared not. There was a chance—as there is a 
chance—that the thing feared might be averted. I 
was obliged to respect your father’s wishes. I have 
acted in accordance with them now, as the only 
means of restraining you from an act which the law, 
unfortunately, does not pronounce a crime, but which 
would be worse, far worse, than many a crime the 
llaw punishes severely. Think, Marmaduke. To 
/marry—to deceive an innocent girl—to become the 
father of children inheriting—” 

“ Do not torture me. What can I do ? What can 
I do?” And Marmaduke walked up and down the 
dusky room, sometimes wringing his hands, some¬ 
times clasping them behind him. “ Does anyone 
know of this but you ?” 


MARMADUKE VISITS DR. BILLINGTON. 


103 


*• Not a living soul.” 

“ Not even George ?” 

“ Not even George.” 

“And will you promise me upon your honor that 
no one shall ever know ?” 

“ A physician like me,” answered the doctor proud¬ 
ly, “ does not need to give his word of honor. His 
patients’ secrets are his own. Nevertheless, I pity 
you deeply. And I give you my word of honor. But 
you see, do you not, the impossibility of this mar¬ 
riage ?” 

“ I see scarcely anything clearly at this moment; I 
feel, rather than see, that it can never be.” 

“ That is in the line of duty,” replied the doctor. 
“ Right feeling is the common-sense of the heart.” 

“ But what can I do ? What can I do ?” repeated 
Marmaduke, less as a question to which he awaited a 
reply, than as a wild interrogation to his own soul 
dumbly struggling in darkness. 

“ Sit down,” said the doctor gently. Marmaduke 
complied. This time he did not refuse the wine the 
doctor offered him. 

“ You must either tell Miss Orme the truth, or you 
must not. If you do not, marriage follows, children 
will come, and you carry with you the burden of a 
secret, liable at any moment to be discovered—with 
what result I leave you to imagine. If you do tell 
her,—” 

“Oh, no. I can never tell her. For her own sake 
I cannot do that. Her great love for me would not 
allow her to desert me. She would cling to me all 
the more. Her love would redouble. Love would 
become duty, and duty, love. I should be compelled 









104 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


to marry her, by virtue of that love, against my 
reason—if a man like me may speak of reason. I 
should be keeping her from the happiness she might 
experience with a man every way fitted to become 
her husband.” 

The doctor’s lips twiched. He thought of George. 

“You would be compelled to marry her, you say ? 
What of the children ?” 

Marmaduke was silent. All sorts of intricate ar¬ 
guments and subtle reasonings, that he did not wish 
to express, were working in his brain. He was 
thinking that some marriages are childless, that there 
are husbands and wives who are parents merely in 
spirit, and who voluntarily go to the grave never 
knowing the touch of little hands, the pressure of 
little lips, the prattle of little beings they might have 
brought into the world. Would he have strength to 
tear himself from the arms of one who was waiting to 
be his wife—who would be his wife, such was his 
confidence in her love—even though she might learn 
that never was she to be called by the sacred name 
of mother ? 

The doctor, meanwhile, sat watching him, knowing 
perfectly well the passion that was dancing through 
his brain, robed in the guise of reasoning. At last he 
said, addressing Marmaduke with elaborate gentle¬ 
ness: 

“ And what would such a life as that be worth—a 
married life of predetermined, premeditated child¬ 
lessness; a compact which each would always wish 
to be broken, with a phantom ever between you re¬ 
minding you of your vow ? Would not a change be 
sure to steal over the affection of one or the other, as 


MARMADUKE VISITS DR. BILLINGTON. 105 

the years rolled by? Every woman who has never 
had a child is an undeveloped mother. She contains 
motherhood, as the bud contains the flower. Is it 
not possible, then, that apathy, aversion, dislike, even 
hatred, on your wife’s part, might in time take the 
place of love? Is it not possible—” 

Again Marmaduke rose from his chair, motioning 
the doctor to silence with a frantic gesture. 

“ Then, since that is impossible,” continued the 
old man in the same gentle voice, after a moment’s 
silence, “ another plan remains.” Marmaduke hastily 
turned, and listened. “Tell her that you have ex¬ 
amined your own heart, and that though you esteem 
her highly, )^ou find that you do not love her with 
that entire devotion that a husband worthy of her 
ought to have.” 

“ Do you know what she would do ? She would 
give me one look, out of her sweet eyes, and I should 
fall at her feet exclaiming ‘ I have lied. I love you 
—even you —as you are worthy to be loved.’ ” 

“ Then tell her,” said Dr. Billington, clasping his 
chin in great perplexity, “tell her that you cannot, 
you dare not, you will not, ask her to share such pov¬ 
erty as must be yours. After you have resigned 
your fortune, years may pass before you can realize 
a larger income than St. Remigius gives you. The 
plea of poverty would be valid—would be honor¬ 
able.” 

“Why, doctor, you do not understand her,” an¬ 
swered Marmaduke, his voice all broken by the ex¬ 
cessive strain of a contention which he now felt he 
must bring to an end. “Do you know what she 
would answer? She would put her hands in mine. 






106 THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 

and say: ‘ I have been poor all my life. I will work 
for both.’ ” 

The doctor, in his turn, rose, with almost angry 
gesture. 

“What will you say?” he asked, his features work¬ 
ing. 

“ I do not know,” was the answer, coming more 
like a moan than an articulate statement. “ I must 
think. She, like me, must suffer. After a while— 
perhaps she will forget me—perhaps she will love 
again. She will, perhaps, marry. But, doctor, prom¬ 
ise me—” his tongue refused to speak. 

“ What ?” 

*' After all is over—after I am dead—or—or mad— 
promise me that you will tell her all the truth. 
Promise me that you will not let her think of me 
then as she will think—as she must think—do you 
promise ?” 

“ There is my hand. I promise. But what are 
you going to tell her ?” 

“ I do not know. I cannot tell. Ask me no more 
questions. Torture me with no more words. I must 
be alone—alone—or the madness which lies in wait 
for me may fall upon me even here.” 

And without waiting for an answer he rushed from 
the room and the house. 


MARMADUKE AND BEATRICE. 


107 


CHAPTER VI. 

MARMADUKE AND BEATRICE. 

The rest of the night and most of the succeeding 
day were passed in a manner for which Marmaduke 
would have found it hard to account. The excite¬ 
ment through which he had passed affected the en¬ 
tire man. It reduced him to that condition in which 
men who seek relief in strong drink plunge into in¬ 
toxication, giving loose to all the abnormalities la¬ 
tent in their systems, but brought out into raging in¬ 
tensity by such a stimulus. There was nothing 
upon which his thoughts could rest in ease. Sitting 
in his study, listening at midnight to the lonely 
plash of the little fountain, he remembered how, only 
a year ago, he had been accustomed to look upon 
the life that was hid with Christ in God, as the one 
only life which could yield satisfaction here, and pre¬ 
pare the soul to enjoy the fullness of the perfect ex¬ 
istence that lay on the other side of death. He re¬ 
called the hours of spiritual exaltation, when he had 
lost himself in the ecstacies of prayer, and after re¬ 
gaining long upon his knees had felt that the peace 
which passeth understanding was as real as the 
tribulations of which it is announced as the solace 
and the balm. He recollected, with an agony that 
was yearning rather than remorse, the supreme re¬ 
pose he had found in the belief that 






108 THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 

“Jesus can make a dying bed 
Feel soft as downy pillows are;” 

and the confidence with which in all his petty 
troubles—and they all seemed petty now—he had 
laid his head on his pillow at night, sure that all was 
for the best, rejoicing in the spiritual aid that had 
been given him, and the ultimate salvation that was 
instore. Oh, for such sureness of hope now ! Oh, for 
an arm to lean upon, a heart to confide in, a God to 
bow before and whisper to, in this speechless deso¬ 
lation ! He longed for it as a child longs for the em¬ 
brace of the mother who lies dead in her coffin, in¬ 
capable of feeling the infantile fingers that would 
touch her back to life. 

In the midst of this mental confusion another 
clause in his father’s will gradually stood out before 
him, with greater clearness and more emphatic 
meaning than ever before. That clause provided 
that should he ever have any children born out of 
wedlock, he should forfeit the right of bequeathing 
his fortune to any person or institution, or for any 
purpose whatever, and should merely enjoy the in¬ 
come which it yielded during his life. It was plainly 
his father’s intention, therefore, to furnish him with 
every motive for keeping clear of those interests and 
entanglements which are sometimes as near and dear 
to a man as those sanctioned by the law and ap¬ 
proved by conventional usage. There must have 
been, in his father’s mind, a deeply-rooted desire in 
the first place, that his name and family should 
cease to be perpetuated; and in the second place 
that an unhallowed alliance should not meet with 


MARMADUKE AND BEATRICE. I09 

that compensation which brings it into such near re¬ 
semblance to honorable espousal. 

Meanwhile, his Sunday sermon was as yet unwrit¬ 
ten. He glanced at the text he had placed at the 
top of the first page of the virgin paper: “ Like as 
a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them 
that fear Him. For he knoweth our frame; He re- 
membereth that we are dust.” In an access of fury 
he tore the sheet into a hundred pieces and tram¬ 
pled them under foot. No pity had descended upon 
him. No whisper had been borne to him on the 
night breeze, reminding him that Eternal Love was 
beneath and around him, to protect and shield him 
from the lightning-laden storm. He felt that now, 
indeed, that he had trampled the divine message be¬ 
neath his heel, he had preached his last sermon, 
whatever the bishop’s answer might be, and that 
never again should he utter to a congregation of rev¬ 
erent heads, “ The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, 
and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy 
Ghost, be with us all evermore, Amen.” 

A slowly formed purpose at last defined itself 
upon the black background. It grew out of the 
logic of the feelings—that logic which has no prem¬ 
ises, but only a series of conclusions—as well as out 
of the mental processes which enabled him to see 
clearly his position. Not having slept during the 
night, he secluded himself all day, scarcely touching 
the food which his house-keeper, a kindly woman, 
who adored him, sent to his study, and denying 
himself under the plea of illness, to the one or two 
visitors that called. Through the long day he man¬ 
aged to gather some scattered hours of sleep; but 






no 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


through them trooped a wierd and ghastly proces¬ 
sion of all the faces he had ever looked upon, from 
childhood up, distorted into hideous caricatures of 
reality. Memory poured forth her store-house 
during that dreadful day, but it was as though mem¬ 
ory herself was blighted, and her treasury a tomb 
yielding up an untimely and unhallowed resurrec¬ 
tion. 

Finally, as evening came, he arose from his leth¬ 
argy, and refreshed and dressed himself with that 
punctilious care which men and women have been 
known to use when making ready for execution. A 
sort of tranquil terror took possession of him. The 
measure he was about to adopt was so final, that it 
left him without a tremble in its contemplation. The 
mother who has watched over an ailing child month 
after month, and has seen it fading away in her arms 
until it seemed that scarcely enough flesh was left to 
contain the little spirit beating its wings for flight, 
may imagine perhaps the supremacy of his despair, 
and forbear bewailing that there is no grief like unto 
hers. 

His toilette completed, he walked around to Mrs. 
Mincer’s and was requested to go up stairs, as we 
have seen. 

We seem to have kept him waiting a very long 
time at Mrs. Orme’s door; but in fact he did not 
hesitate more than half a minute. Then he gave his 
accustomed knock, to which the usual “Entrez” 
came in answer, and in another instant he found him¬ 
self in the presence of the two ladies to whom he had 
lately become the most important human being in 
the universe. 


MARMADUKE AND BEATRICE. 


Ill 


He touched his lips to Mrs. Orme’s hand with his 
accustomed courtesy, and as the old lady turned her 
head away, with graceful dexterity, he folded Beat¬ 
rice in a caress in which she felt his arms tremble, 
and perceived the quivering of his kiss. She drew 
herself back a little to look at him more fully. 
His eyes were averted, but compelling himself to 
answer her gaze, he gave her a glance so unwonted 
in its concentrated pain that she clutched him by the 
arm and exclaimed, under her breath: 

“ What is the matter?” 

Mrs. Orme turned round. Close observer of men 
and things, she too perceived that something remark¬ 
able had happened and was about to happen. She 
laid one hand softly on Marmaduke’s other arm, and 
motioned him into a large easy chair that stood in 
the centre of the room. He sank into it, feeling that 
curious sense of unreality that comes to us when we 
are passing through some foreseen crisis for which we 
have sedulously prepared ourselves, knowing that our 
behavior at the time will by no means correspond to 
the line proposed. 

“ I shall have to begin,” said Marmaduke, glancing 
first at Beatrice, who was seated near him, and then 
addressing Mrs. Orme, “ with a most discourteous 
request. But perhaps you will forgive me afterwards 
—some day, at least—for having made it. It is nec-> 
essary, absolutely necessary, that I should speak with 
Beatrice alone—quite alone—and there is no place 
where T can do so except this room.” 

Mrs. Orme had seen a great deal of the world, and 
had suffered much. She perceived that some sorrow, 
profound in nature, was weighing upon Marmaduke. 





112 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


The affection she had for him was strongly tinctured 
by the reverence in which she held his sacred office. 
She had always been accustomed to look upon him 
as the embodiment of manly vigor and prowess, 
gentle as he was of speech and manner. But this 
voice of excessive tenderness in which he addressed 
her now, this pleading and almost timid look coming 
from eyes that she had scarcely ever seen unradiant 
with fire and force, took her by surprise, and warned 
her that so singular a request would not have been 
made but for the most urgent reason. With all her 
experience and intuition she could not, of course, di¬ 
vine what that reason could be. Recognizing the 
gravity of the occasion, she arose, with very serious 
face, and went into the adjoining room, between 
which and the one Beatrice and Marmaduke were 
left occupying, however, there was no communicating 
door. She motioned Marmaduke not to rise, and 
herself opened and closed the door which led into the 
hall, with a certain quiet dignity. Arrived in the 
other room, she restrained her curiosity, as only a 
saint or a perfectly well-bred person can. She took 
up the “ Imitation of Christ,” which she was never 
tired of reading; and as often as her thoughts roved, 
drew them back and fixed them upon those wonder¬ 
ful sentences, which seem struck from the pure cry¬ 
stal of the spirit. 

Meanwhile Marmaduke had risen and stood bend¬ 
ing upon Beatrice a look full of meaning, w’hich, in 
her ignorance of what had passed between him and 
Dr. Billington the night before, she thought she could 
interpret. She rose, too, and laying one hand gently 
on his shoulder said: 


MARMADUKE AND BEATRICE. 113 

“ If it gives you so much pain, see whether I cannot 
help you. I am sure I know.” 

“You know? That is impossible.” 

“ Ah, but I am sure I do,” she replied, with an in¬ 
finitely sad smile. “ Why did you not tell me before ? 
You knew you would have to tell me sooner or later. 
I have not even mentioned it to my mother yet—be¬ 
cause I was sure, until I saw how you looked this 
evening, that it could not be true.” 

He gazed at her in wonder. What could she mean ? 
She answered his look by taking from a drawer in the 
cabinet, a newspaper—ah! those tell-tale newspapers! 
How many a secret they anticipate. Only three days 
before, his name figured in the one which George 
Billington had shown his father. That which Beat¬ 
rice now handed him was from a distant city—it had 
reached her that morning, she said, having been 
mailed by a friend whose handwriting she recognized 
—and in it she saw a marked paragraph that read 
thus: 

“It is rumored that the Rev. Marmaduke Allan, 
known as the millionaire-minister, will soon cease to 
be connected with the Church of St. Remigius, or in 
fact with the Episcopalian Church, a radical change 
having recently taken place in his religious views. It 
is said that he has become an agnostic Of the most 
pronounced type.” 

Marmaduke laid the paper aside. Nothing seemed 
capable of astonishing him now. If anything had 
been, he would have wondered how this secret had 
transpired previous to his reception of an answer 
from the bishop. He would have remarked that the 
paper was published in the city where he had ad- 





H4 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


dressed a letter to that prelate, and he would have 
questioned by what subtle means the subject of a 
conference which had taken place between the bishop 
and two presbyters could have become known sub¬ 
stantially to the outside world before it had reached 
himself, whom it so peculiarly concerned. As it was, 
he said nothing, but breathed deeply, and became 
aware that Beatrice was clinging to him, murmuring 
in her soft, passionate voice: 

“ Then it is true, then ? I did not believe it. I 
would not believe it. I had seen no cause to suspect 
it. But when you came in to-night, oh! Marmaduke, 
my darling, you looked as though you felt that even 
God had deserted you—you looked so strangely, and 
acted so strangely that I leaped to the conclusion it 
must be true. Marmaduke, speak to me. Why did 
you not tell me—tell me long ago ? Is it because you 
thought I would not love you ) Why could you not 
trust me? Oh, Marmaduke, I love you all the more. 
You are almost my God to me—for you led me to 
H im. Think what I should be, if I should lose you. 
And do you think, then, I do not know how you feel, 
now that you have lost your God—the One who has 
been to you almost what you have been to me? Oh! 
darling! Never imagine I can cease to love you. 
There! and there! and there!” 

She enfolded his neck with her arms, and bringing 
his face down laid her tender cheek on his, kissing 
him with an artless pity and an exalted abandon that 
told the story of her love as sweetly as her words had 
done. Overcome by this absolute surrender, he held 
her tightly in his arms, kissing her over and over 
again with the madness with which one quaffs some 


MARMADUKE AND BEATRICE. 


”5 


bliss-giving elixir, that he knows he is never more to 
taste again, no matter how he may plead and pray 
for it. What agony, to have such love as this poured 
upon him in all its heavenly fullness and rapturous 
simplicity, and to be compelled to put it all away, 
and wander through the rest of his life alone ! No 
wonder that the tears rushed from his eyes at this 
torturing moment, and that it required all the effort 
of which he was capable to prevent a return of that 
frightful, sardonic laughter which had convulsed him 
the night before, as though fate itself were jeering at 
his grief. Gently he released her, at last, and they 
sat down together, her hands clasped in his. 

“ I did not know that this secret would leak out,” 
he managed to say. “ I intended to tell you, as soon 
as I received my answer from the bishop. You, of 
course, were the first one whom I would have told. I 
did not mention it before, because—in short because 
I could not bear to do an act or say a word that might 
cast the slightest shadow on our love.” 

“ Ah, Marmaduke, it can cast a shadow on our love, 
but it cannot kill it, it cannot alter it. What could do 
that ? The flower that has begun to bloom, blooms 
on, though the sun cease to shine.” 

She looked up into his eyes with such simple con¬ 
fidence in his steadfastness and truth, that he closed 
them for a moment, in his great despair. 

“And now tell me all about it,” she continued. 
“ How did this change occur ? When did you begin 
to doubt ? What is it that you doubt? God’s good¬ 
ness ? Why, he has given us to each other. Marma¬ 
duke, is there no goodness in that? But I will not 
weary you with questions, now,” she went on, per- 




THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


116 

ceiving the hesitation of his manner. “ I can under¬ 
stand that you have passed through an immense 
struggle, that you have suffered, are suffering, will 
continue to suffer. You shall tell me in your own 
time, and in your own way. And may it not be, Mar- 
maduke—though not perhaps until after months, and 
even years shall have passed—may it not be, even 
though it should not happen until you lie upon a 
dying bed—that I, whom you taught how sweet re¬ 
ligion is, shall lead you back again, shall persuade 
you to believe that there is a God, there is a heaven, 
there is an immortality, where souls that love shall 
discover that there is no limit and no end to love, 
forever and forever ?” 

She paused, her face glowing as with an inner 
spiritual light. Again he mastered himself and re¬ 
plied in a low voice that trembled: 

“Dearest, you will never lead me back, for I shall 
never be able to go. After what I have to say is said, 
you will never stretch forth your hand to me again— 
you could not even if you wished—and if you did, I 
should never be able to take it.” 

She looked at him with extreme attention, carefully 
watching his eyes, the nervous motion of his fingers, 
every little expression and gesture. The love-light 
had not died upon her face. On the contrary, it had 
intensified, but there mingled with it a dawning 
wonder. 

“Of course,” continued Marmaduke, his voice 
growing steadier, “I had intended to give you the 
entire history of my declension—my struggles, my 
combat, my defeat, if so it must be called. All that 
is useless now. Read the history of any soul that 


MARMADUKE AND BEATRICE. 117 

has conscientiously forsaken the religion of its 
youth, and is cast upon the waters of universal scep¬ 
ticism, and you will realize what I have been through. 
Although I have not yet received the bishop’s letter, 
I have preached my last sermon. I am too ill to 
preach next Sunday—too ill to conduct the services, 
even were it not the basest hypocrisy to do so. Be¬ 
sides, all that, now, is of comparatively little impor¬ 
tance. Beatrice—we must part.” 

“ Part ?” 

Never in all his after life did he forget the tone of 
that one word. The wonder had deepened in her 
lovely eyes, and now was mixed with fear—as when 
one feels for the first time the earth shudder beneath 
his feet, and realizes that the next throe of the earth¬ 
quake may put a yawning chasm there. 

“ We must part.” 

He repeated the words. What ? He had actually 
spoken, then, the sentence which disunited them. It 
could not be retracted. The thing was done. How¬ 
ever he might feel inclined to alter, at the last mo¬ 
ment, the frightful resolution at which he had ar¬ 
rived, no explanation could explain those words 
away. She sat, with clasped hands, looking intently 
at him, her eyes fixed, her lips motionless, too amazed 
to realize the full import of what she had just heard, 
not even a quiver of the throat betraying emotion, 
for she was too stunned as yet to experience the emo¬ 
tion consequent on such a scene. 

“Yes,” continued Marmaduke, repeating, in a 
dazed manner, recollected scraps of the sentences he 
had put together during the day, and learned by rote, 
as the most appropriate thing to say under the cir- 





Il8 THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 

cumstances, “ I have thought the matter over care¬ 
fully. I have examined my own character. I am 
weak, very weak. Now that I have abandoned the 
church, I have no means of support, and where I am 
to get them, if I marry, is beyond conjecture. I have 
been accustomed to luxury all my life. Marriage 
would leave me penniless. You, I know, are noble 
and strong. You could live through poverty with a 
light heart, and you would cheer me with your great, 
generous nature, until I could turn such talents as I 
possess—if I possess any—to some account. But after 
all, at the best, we should be poor, desperately poor. 
That is all, Beatrice. I could not endure such pov¬ 
erty. Pity me—no ! no ! do not even pity me. Cease 
to think of me—or, if you think of me, think of me 
only to depise—Oh, my God ! my God !” He seized 
her in his arms and kissed her wildly. “ Good-bye ! 
Good-bye ! Never, never, never, shall I see you 
again, until, should I survive you, I come to look 
upon you dead, to kneel beside you, to ask you to 
look upon me from that other world—if there is one — 
when you will understand me and forgive. Beatrice ! 
Yes ! Yes ! Do pity me. Mix a little compassion 
with your contempt. Remember, if you will, that 
when I was a priest of God I was brave and loyal, 
and charge the meanness and baseness of my spirit 
to my desertion of the Christ who died for me. Ah ! 
No! Do not hold me. Take your little hand away. 

I cannot bear it. There, dearest; my last kiss. I 
love you—I shall always love you until death.” 

He unfastened the hand which she indeed had laid 
upon his shoulder as he knelt before her ; kissed her 
parted lips ; pressed the lids down over her widely- 


MARMADUKE AND BEATRICE. 


W 


\ 


ll 9 


open eyes that he might kiss them too. Then he 
would have rushed from the room, but the sudden 
coldness of the hand that still rested in his detained 
him. He saw that she had fainted. 

He knew that if he remained until she returned to 
full consciousness, and his eyes once again met hers, 
a>ll would be lost, and he would have no strength left 
to pursue the line of conduct which had already cost 
him so much. He stooped and kissed, with reverent 
tenderness, her mouth, her brow, her eyes, those little 
hands which up to the last had clung to him with 
such mournful, loving incredulity. Then he knocked 
at the door of the other room, opened it, and mo¬ 
tioned Mrs. Orme to come forth. She ran with a low 
cry toward her daughter, raised her in her arms, 
sprinkled water on her face, called her by every en¬ 
dearing and loving name. In a few moments 
Beatrice opened her eyes. Her mother turned to 
question Marmaduke. He was gone. 

That night when Marmaduke reached home—it was 
midnight, and he had been wandering through the 
streets in that trance-like condition which recognizes 
no surroundings—he found a letter waiting for him 
on his desk. By some inadvertency it had been 
wrongly directed, which accounted for its late arrival. 
He tore it open. It was from the bishop, and con¬ 
sisted merely of a few formal lines granting him the 
deposition he had requested, and acceding to his de¬ 
sire that it should take immediate effect. 

Then, indeed, with a bitterness that exceeds the 
bitterness of death, he knew that all was over. With¬ 
out a God, without a church, without a faith, exiled 
from the heart which would have broken to secure 





120 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


him happiness, he fell upon the ground and prayed 
to that Inscrutable Force for which he had exchanged 
his creed, as one who prays in madness—yet feels 
that it is madness to expect reply. 

The next evening, just as Dr. Billington was set¬ 
tling down to his customary novel, the postman was 
making his last round, and a servant brought up a 
letter. It was from Marmaduke, and was thus 
worded : 

Dear Dr. Billington : 

All is over. I have withdrawn from my engage¬ 
ment under the plea that I was unable to endure the 
poverty my marriage would entail. You will, of 
course, regard this confidence, like the other one, as 
sacred. What my future movements will be I do not 
know, but I will communicate with you ere carrying 
them out. Sincerely, 

Marmaduke Allan. 

Dr. Billington read the note carefully twice, and 
then tore it into minute fragments. 

“ I must let George know to-night,” he murmured, 
“ that the engagement is off.” 


MRS. MINCER AND THE D.B.’s. 


12 I 


CHAPTER VII. 

MRS. MINCER AND THE D.B.’s. 

There was lamentation in the Mincer household, 
if such a term may properly be applied to a family of 
two. June had now advanced to the close of its 
second week, and Mrs. Mincer was placed in a condi¬ 
tion which she had often predicted, but which, in all 
probability, she had never seriously apprehended. 
The difficulty was this : the boarding-house was left 
unto her desolate, a thing which had never pre¬ 
viously happened during all her experience. The 
Ormes had departed about the tenth of June, in spite 
of the alluring overture she had made in regard to 
the matting. They had gone to the seaside, or the 
mountainside, or the springs, Mrs. Mincer did not 
clearly recollect which, for she somewhat resented 
their hasty departure, not knowing what private 
reasons may have existed. A youthful couple, who 
had occupied the second-story, back, had suddenly 
made up their minds to keep a flat, mainly, it would 
appear, because they could get one during July and 
August rent free, on condition that they leased it for 
a year from the first of September—a provision not 
unfrequently made by flat-proprietors, in a city where 
it takes one-half the average clerk’s salary to pay the 
rent of six dark, dingy, and ill-ventilated rooms. The 
occupants of her two third-story hall-bedrooms were 





J 22 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


chums, and had saved enough money between them 
to take a run over to Paris and London—two of the 
three centres of the earth, the third being New York. 
A Spanish gentleman who was deaf, and who had the 
strange faculty of understanding all that Mrs. Mincer 
said, and of being understood by her in return, by 
means of a sympathetic pantomime, in which intui-* 
tions bore a great share, had for a long time inhab¬ 
ited the large third-story back-room, winter and sum¬ 
mer, seed-time and harvest. Him Mrs. Mincer had 
become accustomed to regard as a permanency. But 
this summer the Spanish gentleman was seized with 
a desire to visit fatherland—along-delayed nostalgia, 
which, it seemed to Mrs. Mincer, might appropriately 
have been held in abeyance. He had acted upon it, 
however, and had sailed at a week’s notice. Remained 
but one boarder—a stern-faced widow, who dressed 
in black, looked like a grenadier, was agent of the 
Female Universal Peace Society, and w r as installed at 
summer prices in the large third-story front room. 
The serious question which now confronted Mrs. 
Mincer was how, with only tw'elve dollars a week 
coming in, she was to continue to pay a rent which 
extracted from her one hundred and twenty dollars 
a month, besides defraying all the incidentals of 
housekeeping, including the wages of cook and 
chambermaid. 

She figured it all up in her mind’s eye—the only 
ledger she kept—and saw, with harrowing clearness, 
that it was not to be done. She had never yet placed 
on the brick-work at the side of her front door, one 
of those forlorn bits of whitepaper wdiich announce 
that board and lodging (generally for single gentle- 


w 


MRS. MINCER AND THE D.B.'s. 123 

men) are to be had within. She had always adver¬ 
tised. But June was a most melancholy season to 
advertise in, and she had no very great faith that the 
investment would pay. She was extravagant by 
nature ; believed in making hay while the sun shone, 
without being particular to lay up for the day when 
the sun would cease to shine. She was much too 
fond of new frocks and fresh gloves to deny herself 
these luxuries and make weekly visits to a savings 
bank. She had a feeling that it was vulgar to rub 
elbows with the common people who frequented 
those places and were addressed in a somewhat bad¬ 
gering tone by the tellers. It was not often that she 
was “ down in the mouth ” (as Mr. Mincer happily 
phrased it), but she certainly was now ; and former 
visions of the red flag and the auctioneer’s hammer 
repeated themselves with more than their old dis¬ 
tinctness, as she rambled from room to room of her 
deserted house, remembering with what trouble and 
difficulty the furniture had been got and paid for, in 
order that the boarding-house experiment might be 
tried. 

As she was coming down from the upper floor a 
peculiar sound caused her to stop, her hand on the 
banister. It was only the plaintive wailing of a 
violin—the same which the reader has heard on a 
previous occasion, coming from a part of the house 
seldom visited excepting by the rats and the servants. 
A smile stole over Mrs. Mincer’s lively features, as 
she stood thus listening. 

“ Poor Bob ! ” she murmured. “ I wonder what he 
will say when I tell him that Mrs. Barkwood is the 
only boarder left.” 



124 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


Poor Bob, indeed! He had been married twenty 
years now, and had reached the somewhat mollifying 
age of forty, when one is apt to get reconciled to life 
or to relinquish all intention of doing so. He taught 
’ the violin—had done so when she first met him—and 
had endeavored to impart a mastery of that instru¬ 
ment which he was far from possessing. His income, 
therefore, was inconsiderable. Like the stars in space 
he had no visible means ot support, and his indefati¬ 
gable wife had opened the boarding-house as a der¬ 
nier ressort. If not the last infirmity of noble minds, 
it is the first recourse of impecunious women. 

But she never said a word against her husband, 
although she had three names for him, according to 
the moods imposed upon her by an exceedingly vari¬ 
able and emotional nature. She had been known to 
call him Bob, Robert, and Mr. Mincer, within five 
minutes, these changes of temperature—so to speak 
—indicating the nearness or the remoteness with 
which that gentleman fitted in with her notions of 
the propriety of things in general and of his home 
relations in particular. That home she ruled with 
despotic sway, and the only place that Mr. Mincer 
could call his own was the back attic, where his traps 
and what he called his library were collected, and 
whence timid strains from his mangled Stradivarius 
were heard proceeding up to a late hour at night. 

Poor Bob ! As she stood there, feeling her utter 
pennilessness, and her inability to battle succesfully 
with the monster named Life, an unwonted rush of 
tender emotion came over her, and a hundred inci¬ 
dents of their early married years flashed before her, 
like instantaneous photography. At twenty he had 


MRS. MINCER AND THE D.B.’S. 


125 


been like a boy, and at seventeen (she was three 
years* his junior), she had been the veriest child. 
They had taken a cottage not far from the city, at 
twenty-five dollars a month, when his entire income 
was not more than ten dollars a week, and had spent 
most of their summers and autumns in rowing upon 
the adjacent river—a sport of which they were ex¬ 
tremely fond. Her theory of housekeeping at that 
period had been simplicity itself, her plan being to 
put something in to roast, or something in to boil, 
and then lock up the house and let nature take its 
course until the day’s boating was over, and like two 
tired children they returned. A whole ham having 
one morning been confidently consigned to a kettle, 
in the full expectation that it would be in proper 
trim for the table when the evening shades prevailed, 
was found, when they got back, to be in a condition 
of extreme feebleness and tenuity, and was solemnly 
buried in the back garden ere they went supperless 
to bed. But in those days nothing had been able to 
dampen their spirits or crush their capacity for enjoy¬ 
ment. When the weather prevented out-door recrea¬ 
tion they had played cards with an abandon worthy 
of a better cause, trouble being something they had 
read about in the newspapers and occasionally heard 
mentioned in the pulpit, but in which they were not 
personally interested, and with which they had, in 
fact, nothing to do. Then children came—three 
little darlings, one after another. The eldest, Minna, 
grew to be five years old, a precocious, winsome child 
who used to catch up the tunes her father played, 
and sing them to herself with an accuracy that aston¬ 
ished him. She appointed herself the protectress of 





126 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


Johnny, the second child, and watched over him with 
that infantile motherliness, which is at once one of 
the most amusing and one of the most pathetic traits 
in little girls of that age. She it was who, having 
heard that oaks grew from acorns, planted her dolls 
in the garden in the unfaltering belief that they 
would come up babies. And when Johnny died— 
the first terrible grief the young parents had known 
—Minna put away all her toys with his, refused to 
play, refused to be comforted, bade good-bye to her 
little companions who waited for her to join them, 
and literally fretted herself to death within a week 
after Johnny was laid in the grave. Then the hope 
of the young father and mother was settled upon the 
little baby—frail blossom, which clung to life with so 
tiny a tendril, that day by day they could see its 
grasp growing looser, until, presently, the small hand 
released its hold entirely, and lay cold within its 
mother’s, like an unmelted snow-flake. 

That was the brief history of their children. After 
that they had no more. These were episodes that 
were never mentioned between them. A certain 
harshness and stoicism crept over the father, and he 
grew old rapidly within a few years. They remained 
very fond of each other, but the beauty and happi¬ 
ness of their lives had vanished, and each dwelt soli¬ 
tary and apart, only coming closely together on those 
few occasions when disaster threatened to engulf 
them both. Mr. Mincer ceased to take an interest in 
what Dr. Holmes declares to be the pleasant occupa¬ 
tion of living. He loved his violin as much as for¬ 
merly, but he certainly did not improve as a musician 
or a teacher. He lost pupils instead of gaining them; 


MRS. MINCER AND THE D.B.’s. 127 

and his wife perceiving that it would be thus with him 
all the rest of his days, opened a boarding-house and 
furnished it from attic to cellar out of a small legacy 
that had been left her. 

Mr. Mincer did not take to this unkindly. He was 
somewhat chimerical in his notions, and had the idea 
that some time or other some ancestor, who had never 
been revealed to him, would die, leaving him an im¬ 
mense fortune, and that he should find himself adver¬ 
tised for in one of the great dailies of New York. 
Consequently, not a morning passed that he did not 
look for himself, so to speak, under “ Personals,” or 
under that equally interesting head “ Europe,” which 
form features in one or two of these papers. Nothing 
pleased him so much as to come across an announce¬ 
ment like the following: 

“ Archibald Mannering, who is known to have sailed 
through the Strait of Magellan in the year 1869, may 
hear of something to his advantage by applying to 
his step-brother’s mother-in-law, Mrs. Spaddock, at 
No. 9 Worthing Street, Liverpool, or to X. Syren, 
Esq., solicitor, Chester, England.” 

It almost seemed, he would say, as he read these 
words aloud, as though they were meant for him. 
One day he read, in a high voice, to a number of 
boarders who happened to be in the parlor, the 
following: 

“ Notice is hereby given that in the action of the 
Multiplepoinding depending before the Lords of 
Council and Session at the instance of James Wil- 
merding, Grocer, in Porto Bello and others the sole 
trustees original and assumed acting under the Trust 





128 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


Disposition and settlement granted by Cadwallader 
Hammersly, Corn Merchant, residing at Mount Pleas¬ 
ant, Jerusalem, and Mrs. Caroline Hammersly, for¬ 
merly Smithson, sometime wife, thereafter widow of 
the said Cadwallader Hammersly, Pursuers and Real 
raisers against the said James Wilmerding, as an 
individual and others the whole representatives of 
the heir-at-law and of the next of kin of the said 
deceased Cadwallader Hammersly, so far as known 
to the pursuers: the Honorable Lord Kincombe, the 
Lord Ordinary in the cause, issued the following 
order: ‘ The Lord Ordinary finds the Pursuers liable 
only in once and single payment, and appoints inti¬ 
mation of the dependence of the action to be made 
by advertisement in each of the following news¬ 
papers,’ ” etc., etc. 

Hence it may reasonably be urged that Mr. Mincer 
was not of a very practical turn of mind. He was 
likely to “spring” a paragraph like this on any 
boarder at any time. He had a furtive feeling that 
though it did not refer to him, it might have done 
so; and that nothing was more likely than that one 
day he would be found implicated in something of 
the kind. 

All these recollections flashed in a trice through 
Mrs. Mincer’s alert little brain, as she stood there, 
now a smile, now a tear, indicating the varying nature 
of the impression. She was accustomed, when a crisis 
arrived, to go and seek comfort of her husband. A 
crisis had arrived now. So pausing no longer she 
stepped quietly up the stairs leading to the back 
garret, and without knocking opened the door softly 
and went in. 

She had opened it so softly that Mr. Mincer did 


v\ 


MRS. MINCER AND THE D.B.’s. 129 

not at first observe her entrance. She saw before her 
a naan who looked older than he was, but yet retained 
something of a youthful and jaunty air. His brown, 
bulging eyes had a soft look, and his thin, curly 
brown hair, once so abundant, began to reveal a 
white spot, like a dumpling, at the top of his head. 
He was standing sufficiently far from the window not 
to bump against the slanting roof, and was wholly 
absorbed in the Wagnerian movement to which he 
was trying to give expression. 

Apparently he became aware of his wife’s presence 
by that strange magnetism (so-called), which exists 
between long-married couples, for presently he turned 
round, without starting, ceased playing, and, as a 
kindly light stole into his eyes, exclaimed in a low, 
pleasant voice: 

“Well, Jennie.” 

“Well, Bob,” answered Mrs. Mincer, sitting down 
on a stool, whose fourth leg was wanting, at the 
imminent risk of pitching backward, “ the worst has 
come.” 

“ It has, eh ?” replied Bob, taking possession of a 
broken-backed rocking-chair, half of the cane seat of 
which exhibited a downward tendency. “ What’s 
happened now? Anything the matter with the 
D. B.’s ?” 

“ D. B.” the reader will bear in mind was an abbre¬ 
viation invented by Mr. Mincer himself. Being inter¬ 
preted, it meant “ darned boarders,” as Mr. Mincer 
was in the habit of styling the ladies and gentlemen 
'who sought refuge under his roof, though sometimes 
he applied an even stronger epithet. 

“Are you blind, Robert?” asked Mrs. Mincer, re- 







130 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


verting, in her momentary indignation, to the second 
term in her conjugal category. “ Haven’t you seen 
that the table has grown less for the last fortnight ? 
I should think your carving would tell you that. 
Ain’t you aware that Senor Gomez left this morning, 
and that Mrs. Barkwood is the only D. B. remaining?” 

“Why yes, I noticed the table was rather slim,” 
returned Bob, rubbing his chin with the bow in a 
ruminative manner. “But I thought they’d all come 
back again—like the sheep of little Bo-peep, or some¬ 
thing of that kind.” 

“ Mincer, you’re a fool,” returned his wife, nettled 
at this ill-timed jocosity. 

“ I’ve been one all my life,” answered Mr. Mincer, 
with a pensive humility that almost brought the tears 
to his wife’s eyes, “or I wouldn’t be here to-day, 
Jennie. But there’s no use looking on the dark side. 
The very hairs of our head are all numbered.” 

“ It wouldn’t take much to number yours,” said his 
wife spitefully. “ But what I want to know is what 
I’m going to do. This is the worst time of the year, 
so there is no use in advertising, even if we had the 
money. Nobody will even come to look at the rooms 
before the middle of August or the first of September. 
Here we are half way through June. I’ve just enough 
money in hand to pay for the month of July when the 
first comes. Now, how am I to raise two hundred 
and forty dollars to pay for August and September, 
let alone the housekeeping? Oh! how I hate the 
D. B.’s. How I wish I had never been born.” 

“ Perhaps, then, you’d have wished you had,” 
replied her husband, who, it will be seen, was inge¬ 
nious in finding sources of consolation. “ Don’t you 


MRS. MINCER AND THE D.B.’s. 131 

see ? If you hadn’t been born, it would still be before 
you. Better take it as it comes, and have it over 
with.” 

“ Robert Mincer,” said Mrs. Mincer, fixing him with 
a look and adopting a tone of lofty pity, “ you have 
no more soul than the little tramp cat that comes 
three times a day to the basement window to be fed. 
Not as much. For the tramp cat has an affectionate 
nature. But you —” 

She turned to leave the room. 

“ I have a very cold nature,” said her husband in a 
sort of satirical depreciation of himself. 

“ No you haven’t a cold nature, either,” retorted 
his wife, who was wont to contradict him at the most 
unexpected times and places. “ You’ve got a very 
warm nature, or you wouldn’t lend the little money 
you make to Tom, Dick, and Harry, just because 
they look wretched and wear rags. And if anything 
was to be made in music, you’d make it, for you play 
enough, and practice enough, heaven knows. I 
wonder that old Straddlevarious” (this is the way 
Mrs. Mincer pronounced it), “ hasn’t busted long 
ago.” 

“If some rich man would only set me up in busi¬ 
ness,” began Mr. Mincer, and hesitated. 

“What’s that? Say that again,” exclaimed his 
wife, in her alert way, turning round and coming 
back, though she had nearly left the room. “ Read 
it again, Johnson, and read it slow,” she continued 
in one of her oracular utterances, gathered from a 
variety show, as she bent her lively eyes on Bob. 

“ If some rich man would only set me up in busi¬ 
ness,” repeated Bob. 




132 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


“For Heaven’s sake!” exclaimed Jennie. “And 
what business would any rich man set you up in? 
Perhaps you’d like to be set up in the liquor business. 
Or, how would you like to be made Collector of the 
Port ?” 

Whether Mrs. Mincer propounded this question 
under the idea that the collectorship of the port was 
in some way affiliated with the sale of intoxicating 
liquors cannot be known ; but it may safely be taken 
for granted that she meant to imply a good-natured 
contempt for her husband’s business qualifications. 

“ What’s the matter with you, besides your age ?” 
she continued gazing at him with a look in which 
affection blended with a gentle compassion for the 
impracticableness of his character. 

“Not much,” answered Bob ruefully. “Though I 
must say my age has not much to do with my not 
making any money. For I never made much at any 
age. Nevertheless, I think that just at this juncture 
I may be of some use to you.” 

“ You ? Of use ?” 

Such a possibility had plainly never occurred to 
her. 

“ Perhaps I may be able to help you out.” 

“ Help me out ?” 

She caught her breath in astonishment. 

“ Would you like to have a little money ?” 

“ Money ?” 

That was all she was capable of saying. Her hand 
was on the latch, but she came back and resumed her 
seat on the three-legged stool—and this time almost 
did go over. 

“ Because,” said Mr. Mincer, going toward what 


MRS. MINCER AND THE D.B.’s. 


133 


V 


had once been a mahogany desk, but now stood 
shorn of its veneering, like a lamb that had lost its 
wool before being exposed to a badly-tempered wind, 
“ I have got a little money here—” 

“ Money!” almost screamed Mrs. Mincer, jumping 
to her feet. “Money? You? And you never told 
me a word about it. Who owed it you? Did you 
sell your watch ?—or pawn it ?—No. I see the chain. 
Robert Mincer, how did you get that money?” For 
he had now taken from the desk a rather thick roll 
of bills, which he held tightly clenched in one hand, 
the same kindly look shining from his brown eyes. 

“ You’d never guess,” he answered. “ Try.” 

“ On Wall Street,” she answered, grasping at a gi¬ 
gantic possibility, in her anxiety to account for the 
phenomenon. 

He closed his eyes and gave a silent laugh. It was 
like a gasp. The idea of a man like him making 
money on Wall Street was so absurd, that he could 
pay the suggestion no other tribute. 

“ I told you you could never guess. Let me ex¬ 
plain, then. Here are four hundred dollars. It will 
see you through the summer. I earned it." 

“ Earned it i" 

She took the money, feeling quite overwhelmed, 
and went back to the three-legged stool. 

“ I thought you and I could take a little trip some 
where this summer,” he continued. “ We need it. 
At least you do. Keeping D. B.’s is awful hard on 
the nervous system. Uses the ganglions all up, the 
doctors say. It took me a whole year to earn it. It’s 
not doing very well.” 

“ Well, that’s what I call doing very well!" ex- 




134 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


claimed Mrs. Mincer, the tears this time really start¬ 
ing to her sympathetic eyes. She dashed them aside, 
and jumped up and went to her husband. 

“ We’ll give up our trip, Bob, and stay at home and 
pay the rent. And when September comes the house 
will be full again. Oh, Bob! How should I get 
along without you T J 

“Well, I’m not much use in the world,” answered 
Mr. Mincer dolefully. “ Don’t know what I was 
made for.” 

“ Why, you were made to help your wife through 
when she gets in a tight place ; and I—I guess I was 
made to keep D. B.’s to the end of time.” 

She had caught hold of Bob’s arm affectionately. 
Just then an organ-tune, refined by distance, came 
floating softly through the open garret window. It 
was only the “ Sweet Bye and Bye.” But it brought 
to the recollections of both of them, the three little 
children resting years ago in the suburban church¬ 
yard, never more, save in memory, to flash to and fro 
between them, with winsome touch and infantile prat¬ 
tle. A change came over Bob’s face, and he laid 
down the bow, which he had half raised. His arms 
stole around his wife. It was a little idyl amid the 
rough realities of their life ; and as the pathetic strain 
went on, and wore itself away, both forgot their 
troubles for a moment in the soft summer air, until a 
sob from Jennie reminded him how much they were 
to each other, after all. 


IF A MAN DIE, SHALL HE LIVE AGAIN ? 


135 


CHAPTER VIII. 

IF A MAN DIE, SHALL HE LIVE AGAIN ? 

On board the crowded Cunarder which left the 
port of New York in the latter part of that same 
June, bound for Liverpool, were two men, who, as 
soon as the passengers began to settle into those easy 
relationships incidental to a voyage of ten, eight, or 
even six days, attracted almost universal attention. 
One of these was a man more than six feet in height 
and proportionately built. So far as could be judged, 
through the obscuration of that conventional costume 
of coat, vest, and trousers, which veils the Adam in 
even the most symetrically made citizen of Euro¬ 
pean or American birth, he was a splendid specimen 
of physical perfection. His complexion was swarthy. 
His large, black eyes were quietly luminous. A 
beard and mustache which the razor seemed never 
to have profaned increased the masculinity of the 
face. Black hair, full, but not flowing, swept away 
from a forehead whereon a profundity of observation 
not to be ascribed to mere intellect was written. The 
soft curve of the lips indicated a temperate sympathy 
with the sensuous, and the strength which belongs 
to self-balance rather than the effort which comes of 
-self-command. The name of this person, as it figured 
among the list of passengers, was Halkar Zemindra. 

The other man was of the average height, and has 




136 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


already been described. The color and the brightness 
had paled upon his features since he was first intro¬ 
duced to the reader, and in his eyes was the constant 
expression of one who is haunted by a recollection 
and a fear. At the last moment he had been able 
to secure passage through an accident—the sudden 
withdrawal of a passenger whom an emergency had 
compelled to change his plans and postpone his voy¬ 
age. The vacant berth was taken with avidity by 
the one to whom we are now referring, and whose 
name appeared on the published register as Marma- 
duke Allan. It was the element that human beings 
thoughtlessly name chance, which made these men 
occupants of the same stateroom, and brought them 
into closer companionship than else would have been 
probable. 

It was difficult to tell Zemindra’s age. There was 
that in his general appearance, and particularly in 
his gaze (which seemed to begin its passage to the 
outer world from the very background of his soul), 
that proclaimed he had passed through half a cen¬ 
tury ; but this was contradicted in two ways, the 
opposite of each other. One of these was the ex¬ 
treme youthfulness of his step and carriage ; the 
other was the gravity and slowness of speech char¬ 
acteristic of the man of seventy. His mental attitude 
appeared to be that of one who looks from a serene 
height upon human affairs, with great compassion 
and forbearance, but without that exquisite sensi¬ 
bility which makes one suffer in the sufferings of 
another. His bearing resembled that of a philoso¬ 
pher who pities folly too much to laugh either 
at it or with it, and who perceives too clearly the 


IF A MAN DIE, SHALL HE LIVE AGAIN ? 137 

inevitable ultimate outcome of deliberate sin to 
waste upon the sinner any thought or feeling but 
such as is preventive or remedial. Hence he was an 
object of curiosity, wonder, and admiration among 
the voyagers ; but he was not popular. He was 
courteous but not companionable. He fascinated 
without inviting, and was inaccessible without re¬ 
pulsing. He was like one of those snowy peaks which 
glitter in the sun with golden warmth, and in whose 
deepest rifts luxuriant flowers are found,—but few 
there be that find them. 

To this reticent and lonely man, unknown to all 
on board, Marmaduke behaved with that polite 
reserve which he construed to be due to the other’s 
temperament and manner. Had he chosen, the ex¬ 
clergyman could have had as much society as gener¬ 
ally suffices to keep a man in good spirits during 
the tedium of crossing the Atlantic. Immediately 
after receiving the bishop’s letter, he had taken meas¬ 
ures to have the fact of his voluntary deposition 
announced in several religious newspapers, and the 
comment had been universal and by no means favor¬ 
able. When was a priest ever known to renounce 
his vows without scandal taking up her trumpet ? 
Add to this the gossip which fastened around the 
news of his broken betrothal, and his sudden sale of 
the house he had recently bought, and it will be 
understood that Marmaduke had for the last month 
figured in the newspapers of New York sufficiently 
to make him glad to escape to the solitude of the 
ocean and the multitude of a distant continent, even 
had he not been instigated by still stronger motives. 
On board the vessel were several persons whom he 




138 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


had met in his ecclesiastical duties or in general 
society; while it is safe to say that scarcely a saloon- 
passenger was unacquainted with his name and 
those parts of his career upon which the newspapers 
had recently been so lavishly commenting. The 
ocean solitude therefore became to him most dis¬ 
agreeably peopled. He indignantly shrank within 
himself beneath the inquisive glances showered upon 
him, and the all but audible comments that were ex¬ 
changed. This constant chafing was a perpetual 
pin-prick added to the unbearable burden of which 
he could not get rid. In this condition he repelled, 
with cold civility, even the kindest advances—and 
some were really kind—and treated others with a 
haughtiness that forbade repetition and converted 
the offenders into enemies. Self-ostracised, he spent 
most of the time—the weather was delightfully fair— 
in some comparatively lonely corner of the deck, 
gazing upon the ocean, or pretending to peruse a 
book between whose lines he read only the sadness 
of his destiny, and the worthlessness of life. It was 
only after the voyage was one-third over, and his 
isolation was complete, that he unexpectedly dis¬ 
covered he was not to be permitted to nurse his grief 
in such supreme abandon. 

The hour was sunset. He had been trying to read, 
and his eyes rested upon those lines in the “ Rub&i- 
yat” of the astronomer-poet, Omar Khayy&n, laden 
with the poison-balm of seven centuries: 

“ Yet ah, that Spring should vanish with the Rose, 

That Youth’s sweet-scented manuscript should close! 

The Nightingale that in the branches sang, 

Ah ! whence, and whither flown again, who knows? 


IF A MAN DIE, SHALL HE LIVE AGAIN? 139 

“ Would but the Desert of the Fountain yield 
One glimpse—if dimly, yet indeed, revealed, 

To which the fainting Traveller might spring 
s springs the trampled herbage of the field I 

“ Would but some winged Angel, ere too late, 

Arrest the yet unfolded Roll of Fate 
And make the stern Recorder otherwise 
Enregister or quite obliterate! 

“ Ah Love ! Could you and I with Him conspire 
To grasp this sorry scheme of things entire, 

Would we not shatter it to bits, and then 
Re-mould it nearer to the Heart’s desire? 

“ O Threats of Hell and Hopes of Paradise, 

One thing at least is certain —This life flies ; 

One thing is certain and the rest is false : 

The Flower that once has blown, forever dies.” 

Suddenly a shadow fell upon the page which so 
powerfully imaged his thought. Marmaduke did 
not look up. He took it for the shadow of one of 
those tireless promenaders who make pedestrianism 
the business of their lives at sea. But the shadow 
remained, as though the one who threw it were wait¬ 
ing for recognition. With a glance of repressed im¬ 
patience, Marmaduke looked up. To his surprise 
Zemindra stood gazing at him, upon his features a 
look of sweet gravity in which compassion seemed 
struggling to restrain itself into expressionless com¬ 
posure. 

This was the first time that Zemindra had ever 
obtruded himself, so to speak, upon the young man’s 
notice. It would have been impossible for them to 
have been brought into such close contact as they 




140 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


were, one-third of every twenty-four hours, even 
though that one-third were devoted to repose, if not 
to sleep, without a certain friendliness of speech and 
manner having grown up between them. But until 
now it had seldom passed beyond the ordinary 
morning and evening salutations, or the commonplace 
remarks that strangers exchange whom circumstances 
bring into close quarters for a short time. Now, 
however, there was that in Zemindra’s manner which 
bespoke something more than a wish, something less 
than an intention. Extending his hand with gra¬ 
cious gesture, and with a winning smile, the first 
that Marmaduke had seen him wear, he said in ex¬ 
cellent English : 

“ May I see what you have been thinking ?” 

Marmaduke handed him the volume, and indicated 
the stanza, remarking to himself, meanwhile, the sin¬ 
gularity of Zemindra’s wording. He had not said 
“ what you have been reading,” but “ what you have 
been thinking,” as though he had intuitively per¬ 
ceived that the thought of the author and that of 
the reader were the same. 

“ It is an interesting philosophy,” said Zemindra, 
after a moment, handing the book back. “ It is in¬ 
teresting, though sad. It offers no consolation. It 
asserts without proof, and its language is resigned 
despair. It asks no questions.” 

“What question can it ask ? ” murmured Marma¬ 
duke, vaguely, his mind in attune with the Persian’s 
plaintive pessimism. 

“Your own Bible,” answered Zemindra, seating 
himself near, “ offers you one of the most interesting 
of all.” 


IF A MAN DIE, SHALL HE LIVE AGAIN? 141 

Marmaduke looked at him questioningly. 

“ ‘ If a man die, shall he live again ?’ ” said Zemindra, 
his low, but rich and resonant voice blending with 
the tender purple of the gloaming, as though that 
voice itself proceeded from the twilight of the soul. 

Marmaduke started from his lethargy. 

“ I hope not! ” he exclaimed with an involuntary 
energy that surprised himself. 

“ Such hope is useless,” answered Zemindra, quietly, 
his smile fading away, and leaving his face to its 
accustomed calm. “ You might as well hope that 
gravitation will cease to act, or that cohesion will 
reverse its laws. When a man dies he lives again, 
not once but many times. He has many births and 
many deaths before his chain of existence is com¬ 
plete. ” 

Marmaduke remained looking at him, interested, 
for the first time, not in what he said, for these words 
fell on a dulled ear, but in his personality. The 
young man’s studies had not left him altogether un¬ 
acquainted with two of the main doctrines which 
lie at the root of a singular belief that is once again 
lifting its head and making many converts, after 
having for a long time been in abeyance, if not deca¬ 
dence. But those doctrines had passed by him, and 
made no impression upon a heart already committed 
to the teachings of Christianity. And when he 
revolted from the creed in which he had been edu¬ 
cated, the reaction had been so extreme that he had 
taken refuge in nothing less than the conviction that 
he was merely an atom in one, eternal, infinite, uni¬ 
versal Life, which had no consciousness of itself as 
unity, and which was therefore devoid of conscience 




142 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


and responsibility. But now that a doctrine which 
seemed to lie midway between the faith he had re¬ 
jected and the agnosticism he had embraced, was 
propounded to him, in the compelling voice of this 
singularly fascinating and gifted man, he could not 
help regarding the speaker with interest; and it was 
this interest which stirred him from his apathy, and 
made him listen to the words which came next : 

“ The sum of our past lives determines this present 
life. The sum of our past lives, plus this present 
one, determines that which is to follow, after, passing 
through death, we live again. So many triumphs 
here over temptation, ignorance, weakness, and sin, 
so much happier and more prosperous the condition 
of our next existence. You will forgive this little 
homily which I seem to be preaching ; but I see that 
you have suffered very deeply. I have observed how 
you have withdrawn yourself from the whispering 
and gaping crowd. Have patience with me for a few 
moments, and do not think that I seek your confi¬ 
dence—I who am an utter stranger to you. I know 
that there are ills which are quite remediless, so far 
as this life is concerned. There are human beings 
who are born irresponsible, or who become irrespon¬ 
sible ; and so far as we can trace the immediate 
causes, within the limits of this one meagre existence, 
their doom appears to be unjust. To justify and ex¬ 
plain it, we must take a view of the whole cosmical 
circle instead of the infinitesimal arc constituting a 
single human life. You are one of the very few for 
whom my sympathy is as great as my compassion— 
if you will allow me to use, without offense, a word 
which the pride of the average man repudiates.” 


IF A MAN DIE, SHALL HE LIVE AGAIN ? 143 

“ I do not reject either your sympathy or your com¬ 
passion,” answered Marmaduke gently. “ I have suf¬ 
fered too much to have any of the ordinary pride left 
of which you speak. I appreciate your kindness, and 
I recognize in you an immense superiority, I will not 
say to ordinary mankind, for that would be a poor 
compliment, indeed, but to the majority of men noted 
for intellectual vigor. And yet, in spite of all, I feel 
privileged to ask you this: I am as satisfied with my 
religious convictions—if they can be called religious 
—as I can ever be. Do you come to offer me others 
of which there is no proof, or at least of which there 
is no stronger proof than for those I hold ?” 

“ And may I ask what those are ?” 

“ They may be briefly described. The only objec¬ 
tion that can rationally be made to them is that they 
leave unexplained what no religion or philosophy 
that ever existed or that ever can exist, is capable of 
explaining—I mean force, matter, intelligence. These 
things are eternal. The domain they inhabit is in¬ 
finite. Reason is compelled to accept this. It ceases 
to be reason if it does not. Granted this—and you are 
compelled to grant it—whatdoes the universe become? 
The universe, I say; not this ‘atom-globe,’ as the 
boy Chatterton wonderfully called it at the age of 
twelve; not our solar system; not the visible heavens; 
not the furthest reaches of fathomable space revealed 
by the telescope in all directions; not all that the 
boldest flight of the most audacious imagination con¬ 
ceives beyond,—but something stupendously in addi¬ 
tion to all these: the Universe, meaning Space and 
Time, Infinity and Eternity, and all that they contain. 
The mathematics of the soul canpot transcend that 



144 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


calculation. Well, all that is embraced in that de¬ 
finition is to me one Life, of which you and I and all of 
us, are molecules. The doctrine itself is inexplicable, 
but it is no more inexplicable than the existence of a 
Creator who made matter out of something which 
did not previously exist; and though inexplicable it- ^ 
self, it explains everything,—which the other sup¬ 
position does not. The beautiful flower which we 
admire, dies. As Omar Khyydn says, ‘ The flower 
that once has blown, forever dies.’ The preachers 
who illustrate the resurrection theory by claiming 
that in spring the dead rose blooms again, lie. It is 
another rose that blooms, not the one that fell from 
its stalk and was trampled in the mire. So with the 
animal world. The Christian religion, which declares 
that all the sufferings here of those who believe in 
Christ will be everlastingly compensated in the spirit 
world, takes no account of the excessive suffering of 
millions of animals. But if we are a little lower than 
the angels and are treated accordingly, there are 
many animals which are only a little lower than we, 
and which, if we are to obtain future bliss as a re¬ 
compense for present woe, are proportionately en¬ 
titled to corresponding happiness, even though their 
lack of human intelligence prevents their understand¬ 
ing human morality and religion, and accepting a 
mediator. But my theory rationally sweeps away all 
this confusion. Religion, atheism, love, hatred, vir¬ 
tue, vice, beauty, ugliness, spirituality, worldly- 
mindedness, ambition, humility, arrogance, content, 
mind and body, the material and the immaterial, 
the ponderable and the imponderable, mineral, 
vegetable, animal,, and spiritual, are all one Life, 


w 


IF A MAN DIE, SHALL HE LIVE AGAIN ? 145 

Eternal and Infinite, incomprehensible perhaps, even 
to itself, and certainly as incomprehensible to us 
as you or I are to each of the atoms of which we are 
composed.” 

The twilight had deepened. The innumerable stars 
had come out, shining like thickly-strewn pebbles at 
the bottom of the river of space. 

“ Listen,” said Zemindra, bending forward and fix¬ 
ing upon Marmaduke a look which seemed less to 
pierce into his soul, than, passing through his soul, as 
though it were a transparent obstacle, to penetrate 
the time and space that lay beyond it. “ The form of 
pantheism to which, for the present, you have com¬ 
mitted yourself—for it is pantheism—is not so abso¬ 
lutely irreconcilable with the views I have suggested 
as might at first seem. It requires modification—that 
is all. Is it impossible to conceive of an Eternal Being 
—or of Eternal Being, if you choose—who from time 
to time breathes from himself, as it were, these ap¬ 
pearances which we call matter, infusing into those 
forms of being which we call human, that peculiar 
emanation from himself which we name soul ? 
May it not be that that which is erroneously called 
creation is simply a periodic outbreathing of this 
Being, which lasts for millions of ages, fills the uni¬ 
verse with solar systems and their inhabitants, the 
time inevitably arriving when all shall be in-breathed 
again, previous to ages of vacuum and rest? That 
is the career of the One Being. The out-breathing 
and the in-breathing are his periods of activity and 
repose. You and I are—as you say—atoms in that 
career; but we have a more prolonged and interest¬ 
ing experience than you are inclined to concede. We 







146 


THE LADY OF CAWNTORE. 


began our existence many ages ago. We shall con¬ 
tinue it through many ages to come. We have had 
numerous and strange experiences on other worlds 
than t'nis. Perhaps experiences equally as numerous 
and still more strange await us over there,” pointing 
to the sky crowded with its slowly sweeping avalanche 
of stars. “ Do you think that one petty life exhausts 
all we are to learn, or fits us for a sphere of activity 
incalculably more important than we can conceive of 
here? No. The steps are gradual. Long and toil-, 
some has been the road we have separately traversed, 
before meeting here to-night and holding a conversa¬ 
tion on the brink of a fresh future. Before a soul’s 
career is finished, it experiences, according to its 
deserts, the mingled happiness and misery that a 
sentient being can feel. The man who in this life is 
an emperor at whose frown millions of subjects trem¬ 
ble, may in the next be a life-long convict doomed to 
suffer for the crimes he committed on the throne. 
Dives and Lazarus exchange places — not in this life 
necessarily, but after this life is passed. Their con¬ 
ditions are not separated by a great gulf, but only by 
their graves. In this manner humanity works out its 
own salvation. As evil is finally resisted, after bitter 
suffering, the soul rises and expands, purified and 
strengthened by countless incarnations. Its powers 
stupendously increase. New ones develop. To-day, 
on this little earth, it may be merely capable of 
shrewdly attending to matters of barter and sale. It 
guides a ship across the ocean, or causes a convulsion 
in Wall Street, or invents a bit of machinery which 
gives to drudgery a brighter aspect. A million years 
from now it is a vicegerent of the heavens, implicated 


IF A MAN DIE, SHALL HE LIVE AGAIN ? 147 

in the government of solar systems, a factor in the 
equilibrium which preserves systems of planets un¬ 
shattered as they speed through space. Finally, when 
the soul has assimilated all the experience of which 
it is capable, it merges again into that infinite uncon¬ 
sciousness from which it came. Its course is run. 
Perfected memory enables it to string together its in¬ 
carnations, like pearls upon a necklace. One dis¬ 
guised identity runs through all these varying per¬ 
sonalities. Memory co-ordinates them at the last. 
They constitute the developed human being, like 
pictured landscapes superimposed one upon another 
to make one composite whole. But during the final 
years when this revelation takes place, and the soul 
realizes the longitudes and latitudes of its being, 
stretched out into a past that amazes arithmetic, there 
comes to it a yearning to return to its fontal source. 
Its identity begins to cease. That delicious dream¬ 
iness ensues whose end is Nirvana,—that profound 
repose, fiom which there is no awakening,—risks 
over, dangers past, everything lost sight of in wel¬ 
come and eternal rest. Is there not something sub¬ 
lime and consoling in doctrines such as these?” 

Marmaduke, under the spell of Zemindra’s voice, 
had listened as the serpent is said to listen under the 
fascination of music. But when the voice ceased the 
spell was broken, and he seemed to have been giving 
ear to a fantastic and highly imaginative discourse, 
urged by an enthusiast who had not tested con¬ 
viction with reason. He perceived the initial flaw in 
the argument which, postulating, first, the existence 
of one eternal Being, explained the universe as an 
emanation from that Being. But, passing that by, 






148 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


he was willing to see how Zemindra would treat an 
exceedingly practical reply, which anybody might 
properly feel authorized to make to theories so 
strange and startling. He therefore looked coldly 
on Zemindra’s kindly features, and said : 

“ Prove it.” 

Zemindra smiled. 

“There is a saying which Christians have,” he 
answered, “ ‘ The peace of God passeth all under¬ 
standing.’ And it is true. That is a portion of 
Christianity included in the philosophy of which I 
speak. The existence of that feeling known as 4 the 
peace of God’cannot be proved. It cannot be com¬ 
municated from one mind to another. We know it 
only by growing into it. When we are possessed of 
it—and then alone—we know that it is not a dream. 
So with these truths of which I speak. You know 
that they are truths only when you perceive them to 
be so, and you perceive them to be so only when you 
have sufficiently developed to have unfolded a certain 
spiritual sense. In all ages of advanced civilization 
there have been men who saw the interior workings 
of nature as plainly as most people see her exterior. 
Such men not only saw the seed grow when planted 
in the earth, but also saw inside the seed while it 
was growing, and detected the invisible principle 
at work—invisible to these outward eyes. All of 
us have such a sense, but with nearly all of us it is 
latent. The time will come when you will be in¬ 
terested in these-—these 1 theories ’ as I have called 
them. Causes are at work which will surely bring 
it about. You will find in them a consolation to be 



IF A MAN DIE, SHALL HE LIVE AGAIN ? 


149 


discovered nowhere else. I hope I have not wearied 
you.” 

And with a smile which would have been pensive, 
were his bright seriousness capable of becoming so, 
Zemindra arose and left Marmaduke to return to his 
reflections. 

But he did not return to them entirely. They 
were somewhat tinctured by those which Zemindra 
had presented to him. As the vessel sped along and 
he gazed across the vast stretch of waters on which 
the moon printed a different patch of light for every 
eye, his own spirit reflected the unquiet of the waves, 
but remained untouched by any heavenly radiance. 
He tried to argue out what truth might be concealed 
in Zemindra’s theories. However inaccurate their 
starting-point might be, was it unreasonable to sup¬ 
pose that a sequel more or less satisfactory might 
possibly be held in store for this earthly life, where 
man, victim to every misfortune that can be con¬ 
ceived, is knocked about from pillar to post, and 
finds rest only in the grave? And if a sequel, why 
might there not have been a prelude ; and if both 
were possible, why not many sequels and many 
preludes ? He rose and leaned over the vessel’s side. 
He thought, as so many have thought before, that 
we are always at the centre-point between two 
eternities ; and he asked himself, since so much evil 
existed after the lapse of an eternity, whether there 
was the slightest reason to expect that it would dis¬ 
appear during the eternity to come. He questioned 
whether, if his incarnations were as numerous as the 
stars that wearied his searching eyes, he would not 
still bear with him the memory of his lost Beatrice ; 





THE LADY OF CAWNPORK. 


15 ° 

and however great the happiness (inconceivable to 
him now), awaiting him in other personalities, 
whether he would not yearn for the happiness he 
had been compelled to forego on earth. “If a man 
die, shall he live again,” was the question that 
repeated itself over and over again, to his sickened 
fancy. Was it possible that he might hope to meet 
her, not here again on earth, but in some nobler, 
purer, better world whence all the frightful accidents 
of flesh were banished, and where the complete 
satisaction of divinest passions was harmless and 
secure? 

Other conversations with Zemindra followed, and 
Marmaduke was led, less by his reason, than by his 
willingness to be beguiled by the fantastic, the 
imaginative, and the strange, to take a deeper in¬ 
terest in the “ wisdom-religion,” as Zemindra called 
it. Its intelligent reply to every question which 
the neophyte could propound—excepting of course 
those questions which relate to ultimate causes— 
was not without a fascination, and the brilliant 
audacity of its assertions stimulated his curiosity. 
He found, in fact, that his interviews with Zemindra 
had been too few and short, by the time that land 
was sighted. 

They travelled from Liverpool to London together, 
and Marmaduke made up his mind that he would 
accompany his new friend by easy stages as far as 
Brindisi, whence Zemindra intended to sail for his 
native East. They arrived in London in the early 
evening, and it was arranged that they should leave 
it at the expiration of a fortnight. Zemindra had 
pressing engagements, of a business nature, which 


IF A MAN DIE, SHALL HE LIVE AGAIN? 151 

compelled him to leave Marmaduke to his own 
resources that evening, but he promised to breakfast 
with him the next morning. When, however, Mar¬ 
maduke entered the breakfast-room, conscious that 
he was late, and expecting to see Zemindra, with his 
benign serenity, awaiting him, the servant handed 
him a note. It was dated the previous evening, an 
hour before midnight, and read thus : 

“ Forgive me, but I am obliged to depart. By the 
time this reaches you I snail have advanced some 
distance on my eastward path. My master has 
directed me to take the midnight train to Dover and 
to proceed thence to Calais and Brindisi, without an 
instant’s delay, in order to catch the next steamer 
for the East. It would be natural for you to expect 
me to leave some address; it would be only courteous 
in me to do so; but it is beyond my power. I act in 
obedience to commands which I cannot question, 
and I depart upon a mission the nature of which I 
do not yet know. Upon the canvas of the future I 
see you in startling clearness before me, in relation¬ 
ships of which you do not even dream. And that 
future is not remote—though its when and where I 
only vaguely apprehend. 

“Your friend, 

“ Halkar Zemindra.” 




152 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


CHAPTER IX. 

THE SACRED CITY. 

Not far from the centre of Hindoostan, if the in¬ 
tersection of the two lines drawn through its extreme 
length and extreme breadth, respectively, be taken 
as the point of departure, stands a city which is to 
the Hindoo what Mecca is to the Mohammedan and 
Jerusalem to the Christian. It has existed for thou¬ 
sands of years upon the self-same spot. Its origin is 
lost amid the conflicting dates and confused mythol¬ 
ogy of remote antiquity. It had been established in 
glory and honor long before Remus and Romulus 
founded Rome. It antedated the strife of Greece 
with Persia, and was coeval with the contest between 
Nineveh and Babylon. It was mature while Athens 
was in its youth, and from its immeasurable store of 
gold and ivory might have aided Solomon in the 
building of his temple. The reader needs no other 
allusion to remind him we refer to Benares—to convey 
a correct impression of which would require the flash 
of the photograph, the motion of the panorama, and 
the vital touch of the painteu to whom form is passion 
and color speech. Its narrow streets are studded 
with temples and honeycombed with shrines. There 
the many-minaretted mosques of the Mussulman 
gleam like a bewildering wilderness of gold, and 
hundreds of Hindoo sanctuaries, small but beautiful, 


THE SACRED CITY. 


*53 


lavishly ornamented, delicately carved, crowded with 
bas-reliefs, and laden with infinitesimal sculpturing, 
are eccentric with idols in which the monstrous sym¬ 
bols the divine, and the grotesque becomes a god. 

Fairily enchanting did this old city seem to the 
eyes of a lonely traveller who approached it from 
the Ganges one evening about six months after the 
occurrences narrated in the previous chapter. He 
had been proceeding by easy stages from Chander- 
nagor, in a dirtgui, a sort of boat peculiar to that 
country, provided with a small cabin, and furnished 
with a crew consisting of a cercar or head boatman, 
and six maconas or rowmen, belonging to the caste 
of fishermen. It was the hour of sunset, and as the 
boat rapidly shot along the tide, the ever-golden 
Ganges became reddened with fiery light, as though 
a thousand sacred bulls had been slaughtered by 
sacrilegious hands and mingled their life blood with 
that holy river. 

Mile after mile the crooked banks of the magnifi¬ 
cent stream were fringed with a glittering arabesque 
of minarets and towers, that shone sharply in the 
crystal air, above the heavily massed palaces of 
wealthy rajahs. Innumerable arcades, supported by 
slender'columns, revealed balustrated terraces, where 
tanks of cool water reposed beneath the guardian 
shades of tamarind and banana trees. Richly ver- 
dured gardens were voluptuously freckled with a 
thousand brilliant flowers, amid which the lotos, 
sacred to Brahma, swung in stately ease. Building 
and garden, palace and pagoda succeeded each other 
with fantastic inconsistency, as though magically 
convulsed into picturesque disorder. Every now 


i54 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


and then gigantic stairs of marble traversed the 
steep bluff on which the city is built, and lost them¬ 
selves in the water. Upon these steps myriads of 
men, women, and children were ascending and de¬ 
scending, transfigured by the sunset into dusky angels 
upon a glorified ladder. Sometimes groups reposed 
there with every attitude of languor, while the mul- * 
titude of bathers along the shore had its numbers 
replenished from time to time, the newcomers taking 
the places of those, who, refreshed by their ablutions, 
put aside their bathing dresses, assumed those appro¬ 
priate for street and house, and disappeared among 
the throngs upon the step-hewn slopes. 

As the traveller watched this spectacle in silent 
admiration, the dingui slackened its pace, and he 
saw, from the preparations made by the cercar to 
land, that he had reached his destination. A small 
flight of steps of Chunar stone descended from a 
darkly-foliaged garden, in which the peepul tree, 
with its thickly corrugated bark, was predominant. 
Near the bottom of the steps stood an elderly man, 
with kindly face and silvered hair. His white com¬ 
plexion was deeply sun-burned, but there was no 
mistaking his Caucasian cast of feature. He waited 
tranquilly until the boat was made fast, and the trav¬ 
eller prepared to disembark; then, extending his 
right hand, said, in English, in a clear, cordial voice: 

“ Welcome to Benares, Mr. Allan.” 

“ My dear Mr. Loveridge, I am so delighted to see 
you,” exclaimed Marmaduke, stepping from the boat 
and grasping the old man’s outstreched hand in both 
his own. “ The sight of your familiar face does me 


THE SACRED CITY. 155 

good after my long journey, for I have not seen an 
American since I left Brindisi.” 

Then, giving a few directions to the chief boatman 
and followed by two servants who had accompanied 
him (one of whom was a cansama or valet, and the 
other a metor, who had prepared his meals), he 
mounted the steps, and wound his way, half led by 
Mr. Loveridge, through a garden reeking with per¬ 
fume, until he entered the small but stately palace 
(one of the last possessions of an impoverished native 
prince), which he had been so fortunate as to secure 
for a habitation. 

Marmaduke has changed somewhat in appearance 
since we last saw him. His features, bronzed by the 
tropic sun, have assumed a more emphatically virile 
cast, assisted by the recently permitted growth of a 
light brown beard. The boyish delicacy has left his 
cheeks, and the curves of his mouth have a trifle 
straightened themselves into decisive lines. The 
very color of his eyes appears to have deepened as if 
the thought they so habitually expressed had left 
within them something of its shadow. There is 
another change, too, which does not escape the 
recognition of the elder man, as he accompanies 
Marmaduke into the upper apartments, whence from 
cool alcoves, a view can be obtained of the wonder¬ 
ful city. Among those who lead a life of aspiration 
and prayer there is a certain bloom of the spirit 
which gives a tender brightness to the most homely 
face. Mr. Loveridge remembered how he had loved 
to look upon that brightness, when, seeking a vaca¬ 
tion from his Indian missionary labors, a few years 
ago, he had visited his native city, and met Marma- 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


156 

duke, then in the ardor of clerical studies. No trace 
of that inner radiance now remained. It had seemed 
to the old man, what it was in reality, the spiritual 
illumination of one whose life, in the language of 
’ Scripture, was “ hid with Christ in God,” or at least 
of one who endeavored so to order his life. 

Alone in London, Marmaduke had made no direct 
effort to rouse himself from the listlessness which had 
become habitual. Some of his companion voyagers 
across the Atlantic were staying at the same hotel, 
and would fain have made the acquaintance, and 
even have endeavored to secure the friendship of a 
man around whom gossip had scattered her most 
mystifying sentences. But he had maintained his re¬ 
serve, and, for the rest, neither the pleasures nor 
the sights of the town had any attraction for him. 
He buried himself, day after day, in the British Mu¬ 
seum, and if we had been privileged to look over his 
shoulder we should have found him immersed in a 
volume of Sanscrit, of which language he had some 
knowledge. In fact he was absorbed in the task of 
finding consolation. Disappointed in his sudden 
desertion by Zemindra, and unable to comprehend 
the mysterious language of the Hindoo’s note, he 
found, to his surprise, that the vague outline drawn 
by Zemindra of the wisdom-religion, had found lodg¬ 
ment in his heart and refused to be ejected. He was 
attracted by a force mighty as gravitation toward 
7 the gigantic and fantastic network of doctrine which 
only the subtle Hindoo imagination had been capable 
of weaving, and which claimed to have descended, 
through countless generations, from immemorial 
time. The upheaval of his faith rendered it impossi- 


THE SACRED CITY. 


157 


ble that he should seek satisfaction where he had 
found it of yore. The pantheism wherein he had 
discovered a sort of despairing delight, held out to 
him merely that forkirn hope which assures the suf¬ 
ferer that happiness and misery alike must ere long 
have an end. But the theory of re-incarnation, as set 
forth by Zemindra, seemed to promise a substantial 
indemnity, remote, perhaps, but assured. He was, 
therefore, gradually let into the study of that philos¬ 
ophy of which traces are discoverable among the 
Magi, the Chaldeans, the Egyptians, the Hebrew 
Cabalists, and the Hindoo Brahmins. Of all ancient 
lands India is the only one that contains the whole 
of this philosophy, which made its way thence to 
Persia and Chaldea. He became as deeply interested, 
as the unrelieved suffering he endured would permit, 
in those singular phenomena said to be produced by 
the employment of occult forces of which the vast 
majority are wholly ignorant, and which the science 
of the Occident does not take into account. He was 
not ignorant that in making these researches he had 
upon his side an exceedingly small minority of men 
who were among the most intellectual that Western 
civilization has produced, and he did not forget that 
the vast fabrics of antiquity, constructed by human 
hands, attest the fact that nations long since vanished 
were in possession of secrets of nature past our find¬ 
ing out. He perceived that it was demonstrable that 
many years of ablution, maceration, fasting and 
prayer, are capable of bringing about mental and 
phsiological changes, that appear to be the concomit¬ 
ant of power to which the term supernatural is igno¬ 
rantly applied, and the whole tendency of the influ- 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


158 

ence that came over him was to draw him toward 
that central seat where occultism has its home, and 
where it is studied now as cloistrally and as enthusi¬ 
astically as it was thousands of years before the 
Christian era. 

It was in accordance with this influence that he had 
finally made up his mind to go to Benares. He had 
at once written to his former acquaintance, the Rev. 
Mr. Loveridge, who had for many years been a mis¬ 
sionary in India, and enjoyed the rare advantage of 
possessing the friendship of some of the most enlight¬ 
ened and prominent natives there. It was through 
the negotiations thus conducted that a long-vacated 
palace had been leased from a native prince whom 
poverty compelled to live at a distance, and who was 
satisfied to defer the spiritual advantages which every¬ 
body—even the lowest pariah—is supposed to gain 
by a residence in Benares, until the American million¬ 
aire from whom he received so large a rental was 
content to withdraw to a less blessed locality. 

During these six months of seclusion and study he 
had become enamored of the idea of penance and 
fasting. The morbid state to which he was reduced 
had, for the time, weakened the force of his intellect, 
and in order to forget his misery he had to choose 
between the life of the studious and abstemious ere¬ 
mite and the sensual pleasures of the world. Of an 
ardent temperament, he was naturally averse to a 
career that imposed an absolute restraint upon the 
passions, but the revulsion that had taken place with¬ 
in him begot a loathing for those delights against 
which he would have formerly been compelled to 
guard. His cynicism had passed into asceticism, and 


THE SACRED CITY. 


*59 


he would have studied Epictetus with pleasure had 
he not been attracted by a doctrine which premised 
immeasurably more to its votaries than the cold 
imagination of that stern stoic was capable of pictur¬ 
ing. He had come to Benares to be as near as possi¬ 
ble to those wonderful masters of whom Zemindra 
had obscurely hinted, animated by the hope of becom¬ 
ing a disciple, however lowly, so that he might, by as 
quiet gradations as possible, isolate himself from 
every human tie. 

True, it did not look like isolation of this kind, as 
he followed Mr. Loveridge through the many and 
luxurious rooms, floor after floor, making the ac¬ 
quaintance of the retinue of servants, and admiring 
the arrangements that had been made for his comfort. 
But remember, he had never been accustomed to self- 
denial, he had always been used to luxury, he was as 
yet a novitiate only in intention, and he had no idea 
of the task which he fancied he had set out to accom¬ 
plish. The meal to which he and Mr. Loveridge 
presently sat down was prepared by a French cook, 
who was glad to serve in the household of an Amer¬ 
ican nabob ; and it had only those modifications of 
menu which one would expect in an oriental city. 
They sat upon a canopied terrace which overlooked 
both the Ganges and the city, whose houses were 
crowded so closely that from that distance the narrow 
streets were scarcely perceptible. As the sunset be¬ 
came twilight, and the twilight turned to evening, a 
sudden transfiguration took place, which caused Mar- 
maduke to start to his feet in pleased surprise. Sud¬ 
denly the entire city seemed to burst into illumination. 
Alike from Hindoo temple and Mohammedan mosque, 



160 THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 

from palace and pagoda, bungalow and straw-thatched 
hut, from the vessels along the shore, and every well 
and tank, shrine, and landing-place, lighted chirags, 
or lamps, threw their yellow beams, like golden buds 
opening by magic into instant flower. Sanctuaried 
bells rang above the heads of masked and tinselled 
gods, thousands of people—many of the women 
thickly laden with jewels—thronged the streets, and 
scattered sweetmeats and parched grain as thickly as 
flowers and bonbons are lavished at the Roman Car¬ 
nival. The air resounded with the clamors of the 
crowd, and on many of the ghauts (as the steps of 
stone were called that led from bluff to river), some 
of the more sedate muttered prayers to the god 
Bisheswar and guarded their offerings of sugar, rice, 
butter, grain, milk, and flowers, until they could 
throw them inside the stone box found at every 
temple. As Mr. Loveridge explained to Marmaduke, 
it was the feast of Diwali Mela, in honor of Lakshmi, 
the goddess of wealth. The innumerable chirags 
witnessed in what esteem she was held, and the gam¬ 
bling in which the night was to be passed by nearly 
everybody, high or low, of every caste, proved that 
the heathen are not more disposed than Christians 
to seek her favors legitimately. 

The morning that succeeded that first strange 
evening ushered in many days of rambling through¬ 
out the city. Marmaduke was not much of a sight¬ 
seer, but he felt it incumbent upon him to become 
somewhat acquainted with a metropolis that for an 
indefinite time was to be his home. He knew that 
one might as soon expect to separate the mingled 
waters of the Ganges and the Jumna as to omit from 


THE SACRED CITY. 


161 


a study of Benares that sacred element which it has 
worn for many centuries. Thither Sakya Muni went 
when he withdrew from the shadow of the Bodhi tree 
at Gaya, seeking shelter at the monastery now known 
as Sarnath, six hundred years before the time of 
Christ. A century ere that the Chinese, Hiouen 
Thsang, had travelled through the surrounding dis¬ 
trict, taking note of its thirty Buddhist monasteries, 
its one hundred temples, its three thousand monks, 
its ten thousand Hindoos, and its innumerable 
wealthy families abiding in luxurious prosperity. 
The air seemed heavy with the weight of antiquity, 
as Marmaduke threaded the labyrinth of streets, 
sometimes alone, sometimes accompanied by Mr. 
Loveridge, to whom they were all familiar. The city 
was at that time crowded with pilgrims from all parts 
of India, as, indeed, it frequently is during the year. 
Some of them, old and decrepit, had come to die 
upon the banks of the Ganges, and thus, in accord¬ 
ance with their religious belief, go immediately into 
immortal bliss, without undergoing any further in¬ 
carnations. Some had come to bathe in one or more 
of the sacred wells which cleanse alike from disease 
and sin. The number of annual pilgrims equals the 
standing population, and as this is more than two 
hundred thousand, about half a million souls enjoy 
the advantage of being in the Sacred City during 
each revolution of the earth around the sun. 

The reader will gladly absolve us from a minute 
description of the strange sights and sounds that 
Marmaduke encountered in his daily walks. We may 
be excused, however, for mentioning the crinkled 
shores, bordered with vessels gay with flags; the 


162 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


gleaming ghauts dotted with bathers and worship¬ 
pers in all degrees of attire and unattire ; the jutting 
balconies and curiously carved oriels to which sacred 
apes clung by hundreds ; the crowds of holy mendi¬ 
cants almost as tenderly cared for as the holy bulls ; 
the holy bulls themselves, wandering at will through 
the narrow streets, with white skin, black horns, and 
brilliant eyes; the bazaars, where silks and sabres, 
Cashmere shawls and flaming jewels kaleidoscoped 
the rainbow and added a magic sheen ; the proud, 
half-naked Brahmin, with shaven head, sacred cord, 
and dun-colored emblems of Siva powdered on his 
forehead ; the antique capitals, pillars, bases, archi¬ 
traves, plinths, and mouldings that survived as relics 
of an anterior civilization ; the multitudinous shrines 
niched in walls, accommodating scores of thousands 
of idols ; the sacred wells for worshippers and inva¬ 
lids, where flowers are thrown and the Serpent is 
propitiated ; the priests with rods of peacock feath¬ 
ers, and cocoa-nut cups for copper coins ; the Mad- 
huda ka Dewhra, cr Mosque of Arungzeb, with its 
terrace, pillars, and cruciform capitals ; the elephant¬ 
headed gods with gilded aureoles, and the silver-eyed 
goddesses with necklaces of jewels ; the temple of 
Durga, where monkies swarm by the thousand and 
are worshipped as divinities as they leap from roof 
to roof ; the ancient pillars, carved with the lotos, 
revealing its flower, seed-pod, stalk, and flowing 
leaves ; the Bengali, Sanscrit, Hindi, and Mohamme¬ 
dan schools, the learning in which sometimes pene¬ 
trates even the secluded zenana; the quarters of the 
Bengalis and Parsees, where women are actually edu¬ 
cated, and the superstitions of the Hindoo faith have 


THE SACRED CITY. 


163 


little hold ; the deep green gardens in the midst of 
which tanks of cold water shine like melted stars ; 
and finally the languid voluptuousness of night and 
the lurid heats of day, wrapping the semi-eternal 
city in a sensuous atmosphere of passionate un¬ 
reality. 

After Marmaduke had grown accustomed to the 
strange ensemble, and had begun to find his place 
there as part and parcel of it, he learned of the cele¬ 
brated sacred road, known as the Panch-kasi. This 
road is fifty miles long, and encompasses the district 
of Benares. It forms the boundary of the sacred do¬ 
main, on the extreme east of which the city stands. 
It abounds with shrines and is ornamented with a 
double row of trees. Some of these are from twelve 
to seventeen feet in girth, and are nearly three hun¬ 
dred years old. He declined to undertake at pres¬ 
ent this curious pilgrimage, which every one who 
desires the spiritual advantages derived from living 
or dying in Benares is expected some time to accom¬ 
plish, but applied himself to the more serious work 
of initiation into the secrets of the wisdom-religion. 
This he found a more difficult matter than he at first 
thought possible; for though his wealth and his ob¬ 
vious social position immediately made him a person 
of importance, and rendered his palace the resort of 
native princes and learned pundits ; though he be¬ 
came a member of the society known as the Brahmo- 
Somaj, which was liberal in the extreme, and opposed 
to caste and idolatry ; and though, finally, he met 
many persons who were making inquiries in the same 
direction as himself, he received only the vaguest 
information as to the means whereby those spiritual 





164 


THE LADY OF CAWNP0RF.. 


powers might be developed, which enable a man to 
transcend the ordinary laws of nature and to laugh 
at time and space. 

And amid all this intense pursuit of the marvel¬ 
lous, he felt himself forever pursued by that dread of 
insanity which Dr. Billington’s revelation had put so 
plainly before him. After months had passed, and 
he perceived himself apparently getting no nearer 
the object of his search, he secluded himself as much 
as was possible from all the new friends and ac¬ 
quaintances whom circumstances had forced upon 
him, and embraced a course of ascetic living which 
he hoped would finally deaden his sensibilities. He 
ate just enough to sustain life, and gave all his time 
to profound studies in Sanscrit, that wonderful lan¬ 
guage that embodies gigantic and subtle ideas, for 
which the English tongue has no equivalents. He 
entered upon a dream-like life, made up of mysteries 
and exaltations. Sometimes, alone, at midnight, in 
an upper room of his palace, he rose from his books 
and stepping out upon the terrace, gazed, with work¬ 
ing brain, upon the broad, full Ganges, beside whose 
banks, centuries ago, the subtlest thinkers the world 
has ever seen, had constructed, or received through 
inspiration, the fantastic scheme of being in which 
he was now so deeply involved. At such times he 
asked himself whether Dr. Billington’s words were 
not coming true ; whether he was not in the first 
stages of madness, thus to ostracize himself in a 
strange land, among a heathen people, seeking for, 
hidden truths, the proof of which constantly eluded 
him. The fear then returned with tenfold force. 
Insanity seemed close upon him, like Turgenieff’s 



THE SACRED CITY. 


165 

terrible Old Woman, who, symbolizing Death, silently 
pursues her victim to an open grave, and exclaims in 
low but frightful accents, as he cowers shudderingly 
before her : 

“Thou canst not escape me.” 

He saw no possible extrication from this ascetic 
morbidity; but it came at last in a manner that he 
never could have foreseen. 




THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


166 


CHAPTER X. 

THE FAKIR FROM TRANQUEBAR. 

One afternoon a servant brought Marmaduke word 
that the private secretary of the Rajah Suraj Singh 
was waiting in one of the lower rooms, with a note 
from his master. The secretary being admitted, 
Marmaduke perused the note and found that it con¬ 
tained an invitation and a proposition, both of which 
were of interest to him. The invitation related to a 
breakfast which the Rajah intended giving next morn¬ 
ing, and at which he requested the favor of Marma- 
duke’s presence. The proposition was worded to this 
effect: 

“ There has just arrived in this city, from Tranqe- 
bar, a fakir of extraordinary acquirements, in charge 
of the remains of a rich merchant who desired to be 
incinerated in his native Benares. It is necessary for 
the fakir, whose name is Dalpatram, to perform his 
ablutions in the Ganges, daily, for three weeks, in 
honor of the dead. If, out of your proverbial gener¬ 
osity, you are able to find lodgment for Dalpatram, 
however humble, within the boundaries of your estate, 
you will be doing me a favor, and conferring an ob¬ 
ligation upon an initiate of the first class, from whom 
you will doubtless be able to gather much of the in¬ 
formation concerning occult matters which you so 
earnestly and legitimately crave.” 


THE FAKIR FROM TRANQUEBAR. 


167 


This note was written in Hindoostanee, which Mar- 
maduke had mastered sufficiently to gather the 
Rajah’s meaning. Suraj Singh was one of the most 
intelligent of the native princes, a man of liberal 
mind, and social and political influence. He was, 
moreover, popularly believed to be far advanced in 
the knowledge of hidden wisdom, and though Mar- 
maduke had virtually forsaken the lust of the flesh, 
the lust of the eye, and the pride of life, and despised 
mere expediency as much as any man reasonably 
could, he felt that his higher interests demanded that 
he should not refuse the invitation. On the other 
hand, he was only too glad, on principles of general 
benevolence, to grant the houseless fakir the shelter 
requested, and did not need the inducement which 
the Rajah had subtly appended. He therefore sent 
back a particularly courteous acceptance and assent, 
and awaited with something like impatience the 
initiate’s appearance. 

In about an hour’s time the same servant fetched 
word that the fakir had arrived, and Marmaduke gave 
orders to have him shown up. Presently a man 
entered, apparently about seventy years of age. Not 
a pound of superfluous flesh was visible upon his 
dusky body, which was almost entirely nude. A deep 
red scar ran longitudinally across the upper part of 
his skull. To one of the locks of his long, straight 
hair, still black, was fastened a small whistle, three 
inches long. In his hand he carried a seven-knotted 
stick of bamboo, about as large as an ordinary 
wooden lead-pencil. He advanced gravely within a 
few feet of Marmaduke, and bowing low, with hands 
raised to his forehead, said: 




i68 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


“ Saranai aya,” * and then he continued: “ It is I, 
Dalpatram-Omi, son of Naranjara-Omi. May the 
immortal Powers watch over and protect your days.” 

“ Salam, Dalpatram-Omi, son of Naranjara-Omi,” 
answered Marmaduke, who had become versed in 
oriental methods of salutation. “ May you die upon 
the sacred banks of your native river, and may that 
transformation be your last.” 

“ I was bidden to go and gather at random,” an¬ 
swered Dalpatram, “ like the birds in the mango 
groves. Ganesa, the god of travellers, led me to your 
house.” 

“You are very welcome. I have given directions 
for your lodgment and subsistence. The cottage is 
upon the very edge of the Ganges, where you can 
offer your prayers and observe your ablutions in soli¬ 
tude, as long and as often as you desire. Do you 
wish to go there now?” 

“As the Sahib pleases.” 

Marmaduke had risen, and stood facing the fakir, 
whose eyes remained bent upon the ground. But 
with the last sentence the fakir raised them and di¬ 
rected toward the young man a glance beneath which 
he almost quailed. Not that Dalpatram had thrown 
any extraordinary expression into that glance. It 
was the casual questioning look of one who awaits 
another’s pleasure, but the eyes themselves were so 
wonderful that the observer started with something 
of that dread inspired by superstitious fear. They 
were motionless and green, full of an all but dead fire 
which gave hint of expiring embers that might be 


* “ I greet you respectfully. Sahib. 



THE FAKIR FROM TRANQUEBAR. 169 

reawakened. The young man shrank from this cold 
look, in which the last relic of human sympathy seemed 
quenched, yet tried in vain, for an instant, to avert 
his gaze. During that moment he remembered the 
wonderful powers ascribed to these fakirs—a class of 
men who have been much misunderstood by travel¬ 
lers, and who are as different from the jugglers and 
snake-charmers with whom they are confounded as 
the astronomer is different from the astrologist. He 
therefore motioned to the fakir to be seated. In an 
instant Dalpatram assumed that couchant position 
which is peculiar to the East, and placing his seven- 
knotted stick upon the floor, between his crossed legs, 
calmly awaited what his host had to say. 

The palace that Marmaduke occupied was of pecu¬ 
liar construction. It was built of stone and consisted 
of five stories. Each of the stories had a stone floor 
and a cedar ceiling, and was furnished in a style that 
was a compromise between oriental display and Eu¬ 
ropean luxury. All the rooms on each floor opened 
upon covered terraces, which commanded a full view 
of the gardens below and of the Ganges flowing 
past them. Marmaduke had chosen the fifth story 
for his bed-chamber and his study. The windows 
there looked out both upon the Ganges on one side 
and the city on the other. Upon each floor excepting 
the fourth a stone stairway led to the apartment 
above. On the fourth floor a wooden stairway, which 
could be raised with chains, like a drawbridge, was 
substituted; so that when Marmaduke wished to be 
completely isolated, without the possibility of being 
disturbed, he raised this wooden staircase and so be¬ 
came absolutely shut in from the world. With a 


170 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


gesture that the fakir seemed to understand, thougli 
he neither turned his head nor made any other sign of 
curiosity, Marmaduke crossed to the remote corner 
of the large room whence the steps descended, and 
pulling at the heavy chains lifted the staircase into a 
horizontal position and made it fast. Then, alone 
with his visitor, and safe from intrusion, he returned 
to the desk at which he had been seated. Many 
thoughts crowded to his dissatisfied brain, but not 
knowing how far the fakir might feel disposed to 
yield him his confidence, he put, as his initial ques¬ 
tion, the following: 

“Are you at liberty to speak to me about yourself 
and your vocation ?” 

“ Assuredly.” 

“ I have been studying your occult wisdom. It is 
full of fascination. How can one make great ad¬ 
vances in it within the span of one short life ?” 

A change passed over the fakir’s face. It was not a 
smile, though if a smile could have been imagined as 
visiting it, it might have masked under such an 
aspect. The veil of austerity was dropped for a 
moment, and a spark kindled in the dead-green eyes. 

“The Sahib is young. He has not lived in this 
country long. He does not understand how few 
there be who can make great advances in one incar¬ 
nation, or at what a fearful price they are made.” 

“ Speak ; I am listening,” answered Marmaduke, as 
he observed the fakir pause. 

“ I must be brief, or the Sahib will weary. He may 
weary as it is. He is young, but he is too old to be¬ 
come initiated into the secrets he desires.” 

“ At what age should I have begun ?” 


THE FAKIR FROM TRANQUEBAR. 171 

“ At the age of nine years the Brahmin is put under 
the instruction of his director, the Guru. At sixteen 
or eighteen he marries, and may begin the term of 
twenty years through which the first degree of initia¬ 
tion lasts. When ten of those years have elapsed, he 
is no longer his own master. He spends all his time 
in prayers, ablutions, fastings, and mortifications of 
every description. He eats only once a day, after 
sunset. During the second ten years many prayers, 
invocations, and mortifications are added to those 
previously practised. If he pass through this ordeal 
triumphantly, he is then nearly forty years of age, 
and may remain either the head of his family, or a 
priest presiding at public and private worship, or a 
fakir like myself, making use of occult power for the 
manifestation of strange phenomena.” 

Marmaduke drew a long breath. Was this old 
man, whose body bore evidence of severe fasts and 
penances, only a wandering fakir and nothing more? 
After the discipline of twenty years, with more than 
thirty additional years of roving and privation, was 
Dalpatram, whose eyes alone seemed to contain a 
record of wonderful mysteries, merely an initiate of 
the first degree? What more remained? How 
puerile had been his own ambition, in expecting to 
grasp, by a few months of study, passed in a sort of 
luxurious asceticism, a station and a power which 
were the reward of very exceptional natures alone, 
after a life-time of self-denial. 

“ Proceed—^proceed,” he exclaimed in a low tone, 
that bespoke rapt attention. 

“ When an initiate finally decides to remain in one 
of these three conditions, he is never permitted to 



172 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


advance to the second degree. In fact there are very- 
few whose mental or bodily endurance would enable 
them to survive the terrible trials which await the 
candidate for continued advancement. The few who 
do advance to the second degree, submit to a further 
discipline of twenty years. They dwell naked and 
alone, within the temple, studying the Law of the 
Lotos and seen by the people only at remote inter¬ 
vals. After twenty years, those who survive are in¬ 
itiated into the third degree. These live in a state 
of ecstasy, with small sleep and little food, ready for 
Nirvana.” 

“ But is there any organization by which these 
various initiates are governed and controlled?” 

“ Those who have passed the third degree are 
called Nirvanys. Seventy Brahmins, each more than 
seventy years old, are chosen from among them to 
constitute the Supreme Council, and see that the Law 
of the Lotos, or the occult science, is never revealed 
to any but initiates. A Nirvany is obliged to prac-. 
tice the ten virtues prescribed by the divine Manu.” 

“ And they are ? ” 

“ Resignation, good for evil, temperance, probity, 
purity, chastity, subjugation of the senses, knowledge 
of the sacred writings and of the supreme soul, wor¬ 
ship of the truth, abstinence from anger. From 
among the seventy Nirvanys, the Brahmata, or head 
of the Supreme Council, is chosen. He is usually in 
his eightieth year. Then, after having led a career 
of chastity, that has not once been violated, he may 
take up the life that he laid down, and spend his last 
years in full indulgence in the pleasures he resigned. 
Does the Sahib comprehend that the life of the in- 


THE FAKIR FROM TRANQUEBAR. 


173 


itiate, beginning from early boyhood, is no easy thing, 
and that in order to attain the power he covets it is 
necessary to abandon, from childhood, everything 
which makes the heart bound and the senses thrill ?” 

There was a silence. Marmaduke was meditating. 
His eyes were fixed upon the ground. He did not 
raise them immediately, for he knew that the fakir’s 
orbs were turned full upon them, and he did not care 
just then to peer again into those depths in which 
he discovered neither heaven nor hell, only a motion¬ 
less, fathomless tranquillity, with just the suspicion 
of a lurking phantom. 

Finally he looked up and said : 

“ The Rajah Suraj Singh doubtless spoke to you 
of my studies and desires ? ” 

“ The Sahib has said it,” answered the fakir, bow¬ 
ing assent. 

“You have convinced me that my expectations 
were extravagant and childish. I wished to accom¬ 
plish at once what is only acquired after three-score 
years of study and privation under the most favor¬ 
able conditions, and not always then. I must aban¬ 
don that ambition, and be content with very much 
lower progress.” 

“ But the Sahib will remember that our progress 
in this incarnation is an assistance in the next. What 
is to prevent the Sahib becoming a Nirvany in the 
.life that he shall live on earth after this life is over ? ” 

A dreary smile crossed Marmaduke’s face. 

‘“Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,’” he 
muttered, half unconscious that he spoke aloud. 
“‘It is high. I cannot attain unto it.’ But satisfy 
me on one other point, now that we are alone, and 


174 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


then I will let you go, for I must not detain you from 
your evening devotions. Do you possess the faculty 
of imparting movement to inert bodies, without 
touching them? If so, I should like to see a speci¬ 
men of that power.” 

“ Dalpatram-Omi has no such power. He merely 
invokes spirits who lend him their aid.” 

“Will Dalpatram-Omi, then, invoke the spirits, 
and show me what he can do ? ” 

The fakir immediately rose, and raising his hands 
above his head repeated, slowly and distinctly, the 
following words : 

“ May all the powers that wateh over the 
intellectual principle of life, 

And may those that watch over the 
principle of matter, 

Protect me from the wrath of the evil spirits ; 

And may the Immortal Spirit which has 
three forms 

Shield me from the vengeance of Siva.” 

In an immense vase near the terrace stood a huge 
bouquet of fresh flowers, of every imaginable hue. 
Dalpatram now advancing to the vase, gathered them 
in his arms, and threw them in all directions upward 
toward the ceiling. The law of gravitation of course 
drew them down again, but as each descended the 
fakir stretched forth his arms, and instantly it 
mounted up again in a rapid spiral toward the roof. 
In a few moments the large apartment was filled with 
these flowers, which rose and fell in an irregular 
rhythm as the fakir extended or withdrew his arms, 
and finally, as he made an emphatic upward gesture, 
remained motionless against the cedar roof, as though 
painted there by the hand of a cunning artist. At 


THE FAKIR FROM TRANQUEBAR. 


175 


last the old man folded his arms, and the flowers fell 
to the ground in a fragrant shower. 

Amazed at this spectacle, but still incredulous to 
the last degree, Marmaduke passed his hands over 
his eyes as if suspecting an illusion of the senses. 
He was indeed bewildered, though he had only wit¬ 
nessed a performance not a whit more wonderful 
than those recorded by the most intellectual and 
sceptical of western travellers, whose word is unim¬ 
peachable, and who merely described what they saw, 
without attempting an explanation. Suddenly a 
name that was, in fact, never absent from his heart, 
came almost to his lips, and he bethought him of a 
plan whereby the fakir’s power might be still more 
fully tested. He had brought with him a type¬ 
writer, which looked strange indeed in that room, 
standing beneath an image of Buddha, and joining 
points of time separated by twenty-four centuries. 
As he stepped toward it, the fakir, turning to him, 
said : 

“ Is there any question you wish to put to the in¬ 
visible spirits before they go ?” 

“Yes,” answered Marmaduke, and explained to 
him the construction of the alphabet upon the type¬ 
writer. 

“ Now,” continued Marmaduke, bearing in mind the 
manner in which mediums in America and Europe 
spell upon the alphabet, letter by letter, the names of 
persons, unknown to them, in which process they 
assume to be spiritually assisted, “ I wish to spell the 
name of a person of whom I am thinking. When I 
touch the wrong letter I wish the flowers to remain 
motionless. When I touch the right letter I wish 




176 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


them to rise, and continue to rise as long as my fin¬ 
ger presses the letter, until they are hindered by the 
roof. Upon the type-writer the alphabet is irregu¬ 
larly arranged, but that is not material. Each time, 
after the right letter has been indicated, I shall 
begin again from the initial letter, as here arranged, j 
Do you understand ?” 

The fakir, who had listened attentively, bowed his 
head. Marmaduke seated himself before the instru¬ 
ment, and Dalpatram extended his arms toward it. 
The young man touched each letter in the irregular 
order in which they were arranged. The flowers re¬ 
mained motionless until he laid his finger, that 
slightly trembled, upon “ B.” Then the flowers rose 
simultaneously with a soft, soughing sound, like a 
sweet sigh. Startled, he raised his finger, and the 
flowers sank again like a fragrant dream, almost 
broken into wakefulness, then losing itself again in 
sleep. Once more he began, and each time, as he 
touched the respective letters that spelt that adored 
name, the flowers rose high and higher, till at last, 
as his hand continued its pressure on the final char¬ 
acter, they clung close to the dark cedar of the ceil¬ 
ing, and then, as he withdrew from contact, descended 
in an iris-colored rain. “ Beatrice Orme.” It seemed 
beautiful to him that the name of his beloved should 
thus be spelled in flowers. Excited by this strange 
phenomenon, he glanced toward the fakir—who stood 
motionless, his arms folded—and again encountered 
the glamor of those magnetic eyes. Whatever might 
be the explanation of what he had just witnessed, he 
felt that he was in the presence of a very remarkable 
and mysterious personality ; but with that conscious- 


THE FAKIR FROM TRANQUEBAR. 


177 


ness there arose a feeling of resentment against him¬ 
self that he should be susceptible to any influence of 
an eerie nature. Summoning all his self-control, he 
advanced within a foot of the fakir and for the first 
time, with widely opened eyes, and intensely concen¬ 
trated gaze, peered deeply into those orbs which un¬ 
flinchingly spread themselves before him, so to speak, 
like wells of cold green water holding an inscrutable 
secret in their depths. He looked and inwardly 
shuddered, as one will shudder whose curiosity has 
been fascinated into a knowledge of something un¬ 
canny and unholy, which he would fain forget. 
Then, passing to the other side of the room, he said : 

“ One last experiment, and we will close the inter¬ 
view for to-night.” 

Fond of those complicated and curious inventions 
which make use of one of the most delicate forces in 
nature, he had purchased, while in New York, two 
phonographs. One he had kept for himself, and one 
he had given to Beatrice. True, the phonograph had 
not then reached the perfection it has now attained, 
but it was rapidly on its way to it ; and his exceed¬ 
ing anxiety to procure the best instruments acces¬ 
sible, had put in his hands two that were exception¬ 
ally flawless—almost equal to what were presently 
placed on the market. He and Beatrice had some¬ 
times amused themselves by exchanging the recorded 
speeches they had confided to the respective instru¬ 
ments, each taking an almost childish delight in 
hearing the phonograph repeat the message which 
the other had sent. There was one message in par¬ 
ticular which Beatrice had sent him, that Marmaduke 
had never grown weary of hearing his phonograph 




i 7 8 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


repeat, in a voice approximately identical with her 
own. He had parted with a great many things, but 
he had never found it in his heart to part with this 
phonograph, which at that moment stood on the side 
of the room he had now approached, the cherished 
message within, only awaiting the touch of his hand 
upon the exterior machinery, to breathe the spectre of 
her voice into his ear. Often and often, during the 
last few months, had he approached the phonograph, 
intending to regale himself with that sweet sound. 
But each time his courage had failed. He knew that 
he should sink trembling upon his knees at the first 
accent, and wade once more through all the agony of 
their last parting. 

But now he was in a highly excited condition, and 
no longer paused to reflect. He went to the instru¬ 
ment, gave it the slight adjustment that it needed, 
and prepared to turn the crank which set the ma¬ 
chinery in motion. As he did so his face was brought 
in the direction of the fakir. He was surprised so see 
that Dalpatram had turned around, and now stood 
with his gaze fixed intently upon the phonograph and 
his arms stretched toward it in the same imperative 
attitude they had assumed when influencing the 
flowers. He had no time to ask himself whether the 
fakir had guessed the thought that was working in 
his brain, for ere he could touch the handle the pho¬ 
nograph was put in action by an unseen cause. 
Transfixed in amazement, he forgot, for a moment, to 
raise to his ears the flexible tubes used to conduct 
the sounds thus reproduced, and in that moment a 
miracle—so it seemed to him—took place which 
caused him to sink upon the nearest chair, covering 


THE FAKIR FROM TRANQUEBAR. 179 

his face with his hands and quivering from head to 
foot. What was that voice he heard ? What were 
those words ? The voice was that of Beatrice,—per¬ 
fected, as if by magic, to complete identity with hers, 
—and the words, repeated in every accent of passion¬ 
ate fondness in days of yore, stole out plaintively 
upon the air. 

“ I love you forever." 

The whole apartment seemed to be filled with that 
sweet, despairing sigh, “ I love you forever.” The 
flowers echoed it, their perfume caressed it, it lingered 
on the twilight, it murmured in the undulation of 
the golden Ganges. 

Suddenly the fakir’s arm fell. He was streaming 
with perspiration. The instrument stopped. Mar- 
maduke roused himself, and rushing to the staircase, 
unfastened the chains, lowered it to its place, and 
turning to Dalpatram pointed downward with blaz- 
ing eyes. The old man descended without a word. 
Marmaduke drew the staircase up again. The room 
now was almost dark. He flung aside the curtains 
that opened on the terrace. The moonlight rushed 
in and fell upon the prone and profuse flowers. In a 
state of mental excitement, that was almost a tem¬ 
porary madness, he threw himself among them, and 
in a paroxysm of passionate tears repeated: 

“ I love you forever! I love you forever! Oh ! 
my darling, when and where shall we ever meet 
again ?" 




i8o 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


CHAPTER XI. 

THE DANCE OF THE BAYADERES. 

The entertainment to which the Rajah had invited 
Marmaduke was one frequently offered in the East 
by men of wealth to foreigners among them, to whom 
they wish to show particular attention. 

We have seen what were Marmaduke’s reasons for 
accepting the invitation, in spite of the seclusion to 
which he had abandoned himself. The morning 
after his interview with the fakir, when he arose 
from an unrefreshing sleep filled with tormenting 
dreams, he began to look forward to the festivity as 
a needed and welcome relief. The words that Dal- 
patram had spoken had smitten deeply. He knew 
that the Rajah would not have commended him to 
his protection, were it not certain that the fakir was 
unusual in his attainments, and intelligent and trust¬ 
worthy of speech. The intention he had had of pene¬ 
trating the mysteries of the faith he had been inves¬ 
tigating was shattered, and he now saw himself 
merely a hanger-on at the outermost circle of that 
hidden knowledge which he had been so anxious to 
assimilate. Where, then, was he to turn? It had 
been his consolation to believe that by fasting, mor¬ 
tification, and study he might, ere many months had 
rolled by, be brought into intimate communion with 
the most advanced devotees of occultism, and develop 


THE DANCE OF THE BAYADERES. ]8l 

;n himself that mental, moral, and physical condition 
in which desire ceases to exist. In other words, he 
had hoped to kill emotion as the only cure possible 
for his misery. But the revelation made by Dalpat- 
ram deprived him of this hope. He could never ex¬ 
pect to be more than an humble worker in the great 
cause, regarded by initiates as differing from the vul¬ 
gar only by that ardent desire which might pave the 
way for large enlightenment in another life. Nay, 
he had furtively hoped—though perhaps this re¬ 
mained unacknowledged to himself—that his wealth 
would secure him favor, not in the sense that it would 
purchase position, or ensure advancement through 
bribery, but simply because the man who has much 
money and is prepared to spend it liberally, under 
wise direction, is never of unimportance to any or¬ 
ganization which concerns itself with the things of 
this world. Marmaduke had not given sufficient 
weight to the supposition that perhaps the class of 
occultists of which he would fain have been a mem¬ 
ber, does not devote itself to the things of this world, 
but sets its affections entirely upon reunion with the 
generative principle of the universe. 

The greatness of his disappointment caused a reac¬ 
tion. When he arose that morning—and, like the 
natives, he rose at four or five o’clock, in order to en¬ 
joy the cooler hours—he did not apply himself to his 
books, but spent the time in the disquiet of desultory 
thought. What should he do? Where could he look 
for satisfaction ? What sphere lay open to him ? 
How could he be useful ? In what manner could he 
beguile the pilgrimage that lay between him and the 
tomb? 




THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


lS2 

Burdened with such thoughts, he entered his pal¬ 
anquin and was borne to the Rajah’s palace, about a 
mile distant. It was an unobtrusive mansion ot 
stone, not more than three stories in height, in the 
midst of spacious and well-shaded gardens. Upon 
entering the grounds he was met by an upper ser¬ 
vant, corresponding in rank to what we should call 
the major-domo, and escorted to the interior of the 
mansion. He found the prince awaiting him in a 
small reception chamber on the ground floor, where 
a few other guests were assembled, most of whom he 
had previously met. Needless to add that the party 
consisted exclusively of males. It did not number 
more than half a dozen in all, and three of the guests 
were Hindoos. After a mutual exchange of those 
extravagant and flowery compliments which are a 
part of the etiquette of the East, the Rajah led the 
way into a large apartment, where a sumptuous 
breakfast was prepared. 

Breakfast disposed of, the guests followed their 
host to a large terrace, the numerous pillars of which 
supported a stone roof. The curtains were with¬ 
drawn on all sides but one, and canopies outside ex¬ 
cluded the midday glare. The place was filled with 
delicious shadow, save here and there where a stray 
beam pierced an interstice in the tapestries. Plants 
whose rich flowers palpitated against a background 
of equally rich green, touched the air with fragrance, 
and the air itself was kept in motion and rendered 
cool by the ceaseless swaying of immense fans, called 
punkahs, depending from the ceiling and kept in con¬ 
stant and regular motion by means of ropes pulled 
by servants invisibly stationed. As the guests, at 


THE DANCE OF THE BAYADERES. 183 

the Rajah’s request, seated themselves, in oriental 
fashion upon the ground, leaning against the marble 
columns which were close enough to allow of conver¬ 
sation, several native servants entered and dispensed 
large China cups filled with iced rum, ginger, and 
tea, each cup being furnished with a long tube 
through which the liquid might be imbibed without 
the recipient’s changing his position. A hookah was 
then furnished to all who desired one, and cigars 
were placed within reach of the rest. A small boy, 
called chocra, sat beside every hookah, tending its 
fire, the odorous smoke of which rose in balmy 
clouds, and added to the dreaminess of the scene. 

It was the hour when the midday siesta in India 
commences—when everything languishes beneath 
the burning sun, and vivacity itself becomes languor, 
and industry sinks into indolence. All at once the 
Rajah made a sign, and the curtains of silk and sil¬ 
ver at the closed end of the terrace parted as if by 
magic, and five bayaderes, laden with jewels and clad 
in diaphanous raiment, made their appearance and 
began one of those remarkable dances of pose and 
passion which are a favorite entertainment of the 
East. 

Marmaduke had frequently heard of these per¬ 
formances, but had neglected every opportunity of 
witnessing them. He was unprepared for the ex¬ 
ceeding youth, grace, and beauty of these lovely ap¬ 
paritions, and did not at the time understand that 
the bayaderes aie girls given by their parents to the 
priests of the temples, before reaching the tender age 
of five, and that, reared in those temples, they are 
carefully instructed, until they attain the age of 






184 THE lady of cawnpore. 

maiden maturity, in the dances they afterwards prac¬ 
tice, and also acquire various questionable accom¬ 
plishments which render them adepts in witchery. 
A myth exists that the original bayaderes were cour¬ 
tesans and dancers in the heaven of Indra. But 
whatever may be the truth in regard to the origin of 
the class, it is certain that it exists, that girls thus 
bereft of parents are educated in the temples from 
their earliest years, and that some of the most ravish¬ 
ing beauties of India are to be found among their 
number. It frequently happens that the father re¬ 
mains unknown, and that European blood courses in 
the veins of one of these frail and beautiful nymphs, 
who has known nothing all her life but the voluptu¬ 
ous instructions of the temple and the miscellaneous 
entanglements which have showered upon her an 
abundance of money and jewels. These houris are 
never married. They are utterly without caste in a 
country where caste is the very foundation of society. 
A child once surrendered to the temple in this man¬ 
ner can never be reclaimed. She is lost to her par¬ 
ents forever. Her children, if they are girls, inevita¬ 
bly become bayaderes like herself. It is their fate 
before they are born. Her sons become musicians or 
possibly fakirs, attached to some temple. The father 
of such a son may, if he choose, educate him, but he 
can leave him nothing in his will and cannot cause 
him to be received into the paternal caste. A baya¬ 
dere may be described as a voluptuous vestal, fallen 
from the incorruptible condition which her education 
in a temple of worship would seem to imply. She 
may fall very low, but she never falls low enough to 
accept the attentions of a pariah. In the zenith of 


THE DANCE OF THE BAYADERES. 185 

her charms, feted and caressed as she is to the last 
degree, she is despised by the lowest male servant, 
who would never suffer her to sit by his legitimate 
wife. 

Marmaduke, as he regarded with curious eye the 
scene before him, was ignorant of all this. Possibly 
he committed the common mistake of confounding 
the exquisite paces and poses of these five delicious 
girls with the ordinary Nautch dance with which the 
everyday traveller in the East has surfeited the 
European and American reader. Had he been ap¬ 
prised, however, of what awaited him, and had he 
expected dancing in the remotest degree like that 
which one sees at the opera, or in the large ballets of 
continental Europe, he would have been agreeably 
amazed. The dance which now unfolded itself 
before him might be compared to a slow and stately 
minuet, rising by degrees into wild and more diver¬ 
sified measures, until it swelled at last into coryban- 
tic frenzy. It was long, however, in reaching this 
climax. Behind the dancers, bronzed athletes, 
superb specimens of physical perfection, waved 
flaming torches that contrasted strangely with the 
sun-tempered shadows of noontide; and behind 
these, again, musicians twanged uncouth instruments 
and evoked a savage music, whose discord was 
almost converted into harmony by the grace and 
passion of the enchanting peris. And what passion ! 
Marmaduke felt as though he had never seen it in¬ 
terpreted in art, through the medium of the flesh, 
before. It was as though art, in counterfeiting 
nature, had become nature herself. It was as 
though the most hidden secrets of the sensuous soul 



i86 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


threw off their shyness, and lost the sense of shame 
while revelling in that language which consists in 
abandon of gesture, entrancement of gaze, and 
ecstasy of attitude. 

Four of these girls had the dusky skin which 
betrays the undiluted Hindoo birth. The fifth, 
who moved a little in the rear of her companions, 
was evidently what is called an Eurasian—her veins 
probably contained Caucasian blood. Her com¬ 
plexion was somewhat lighter, her eyes less mid¬ 
night in their blackness, and her face had a certain 
gentle charm lacking in the others. A pensive ex¬ 
pression had settled round her eyes and mouth. A 
languorous rather than a passionate grace charac¬ 
terized her motions, and occasionally a haughty dis¬ 
dain appeared to stay her steps. Marmaduke 
noticed, too, that during a pause in the measures, 
she refused the inflaming draught of hemp, ginger, 
and another drug, which was offered to the dancers, 
and of which her companions freely partook. When 
the performance was renewed, the maddening narcot¬ 
ic gave a dithyrambic wildness to their limbs. Fi¬ 
nally all the dancers, excepting the one we have men¬ 
tioned, whirled around with inconceivable velocity, 
until, fainting from dizziness, they fell unconscious 
to the floor. Even then, as the curtains fell over the 
scene of Circean fury, Marmaduke still perceived this 
solitary dancer—the youngest of them all—standing 
motionless among them, her garments almost falling 
from her, like an angel that had dropped its wings, 
in an attitude instinct with the very poetry of con¬ 
tempt. 

The Rajah, accustomed to such spectacles, and 


THE DANCE OF THE BAYADERES. 187 

overcome by the excessive heat, had fallen asleep. 
So, to tell the truth, had one or two of the Hindoos 
among his guests. The others were yielding to the 
drowsy enchantment of the goracco, or smoking-paste, 
consisting of tobacco, molasses, bananas, cinnamon, 
musk, and perhaps, a soupgon of opium, with which 
the hookahs’ fantastic bowls of silver were filled. 
Taking advantage of this general lethargy, Marma- 
duke beckoned toward him an attendant who had 
entered with a tray of sweetmeats, and made some 
inquiries about the dancer whom he had especially 
noticed. He learned, to his surprise, that her his¬ 
tory was materially different from that of the ordi¬ 
nary bayadere. She was an inmate of a temple on 
the outskirts of Benares, and had been recently 
dedicated to it by her widowed mother, who, dying, 
had wished to make this offering to the gods in 
acknowledgment of the care and attention she had 
received from the priests in her last moments. The 
home of mother and daughter had been far to the 
northeast; and the priests who had been journeying 
thither on some pious pilgrimage, had immediately 
conveyed the girl to the temple, in all the freshness 
of her virginal youth, in hopes that her unusual 
attractiveness would in some way redound to the 
advantage of their pagoda. 

As Marmaduke listened to this tale his heart was 
filled with compassion. This, then, accounted for 
the young creature’s sadness and apathy. Until 
lately she had had a peaceful and perhaps happy 
home. That her mother had been a Hindoo was of 
course certain, from the fact of her having with 
dying breath devoted the girl to the life of a bay- 





iS8 the lady of cawnpore. 

adere. But who was the child’s father—for child 
she appeared to Marmaduke to be, although her 
form had reached that rounded development which 
is found in the Hindoo maiden of tender years. He 
must of course have been a European. That would 
account for the lighter complexion and more intel¬ 
lectual cast of countenance which distinguished her. 
Or was she, indeed, the daughter of a European 
woman, who finding it impossible to obtain justice or 
recognition from the father—perhaps some Hindoo 
magnate who had abandoned her—had, at the last 
moment, sought to protect her child in the only way 
possible, and as a forlorn hope, had placed her in the 
hands of the priests ? 

Taking a hasty glance at his conscious and semi¬ 
conscious companions, Marmaduke stepped behind 
the curtains and found the tableau much the same as 
it had been when they had fallen. Four of the 
dancers were prone upon the marble floor, intoxi¬ 
cated with the poison they had drunk, and still 
further incapacitated by the reeling waltz in which 
they had finally indulged. The fifth dancer—she of 
whom he was in quest—had sunk upon a dais of 
green marble at the further end of that part of the 
terrace which was secluded by the curtains, and had 
assumed an attitude of profound dejection. She 
looked up as Marmaduke approached, and a slight 
flutter rippled along her limbs and agitated her 
throat as she heard herself addressed, in imperfect 
Hindoostanee, by the young man, whose handsome 
features had become asceticized by suffering and 
self-imposed privations. 

“You are sad,” he said, with all the pathos he 


THE DANCE OF THE BAYADERES. 189 

could throw into his voice. “ I was so sorry to see it, 
and I know that you must have cause. Would you 
object to tell me the reason ?” 

She raised her dark eyes gently to his face, won by 
the sympathizing accent which deepened the melody 
of his voice. There was a tender violet tint in their 
soft blackness, and they looked questioningly at 
him, as though timidly demanding his motive and 
intention. At first she did not speak. Her lips 
moved without emitting any sound, as though she 
were inwardly uttering a protective prayer or invoca¬ 
tion. 

Marmaduke regarded her with increased interest. 
It was horrible to him to realize the career that 
awaited this beautiful and innocent young creature, 
whose years would have made her esteemed a child 
in his native land. 

“ Have confidence in me,” he continued. “ Per¬ 
haps I can help you. You are not a bayadere, as 
these are bayaderes,” and his glance fell upon the 
four beautiful bronze figures which writhed slightly 
as they lay upon the ground, obedient to the convo¬ 
lutions dictated by some infatuating dream. 

Again that thrill of contempt swept over her, from 
forehead to feet. Then, before looking at him again 
she glanced around, as though fearful of being over¬ 
heard or interrupted. This glance of suspicion and 
circumspection said much. It was not lost upon 
Marmaduke. He lowerd his voice to still more soft 
a tone, and said: 

“ Do you wish to escape?” 

A deep sigh broke from her bosom. She clasped 



190 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


both hands above her heart, and these words left her 
lips: 

“To escape? Yes. To return once more to my 
native Bhotan, where no one would know I had ever 
entered a temple." 

“ But the Brahmins—the priests of the pagoda to 
which you belong—what hold do they have upon 
you? Have they a right to prevent your escape, or 
to force you back should you succeed, and should 
they retake you ?” 

Again the samp sweeping glance of suspicion and 
dread, and then the young girl answered: 

“ No, we are not guarded. I have the right to 
leave the temple if I choose, and never return. But 
if I do, every house will be closed against me. I 
shall have to travel on foot many leagues before I 
reach my native land. The word of the Brahmins 
would go forth that after having once been devoted 
to the service of Siva, I had fled. No one would give 
me rice or saffron. I should be low as the lowest. 
The pariahs alone would consent to eat with me. 
That is the way they treat one here who breaks her 
vows.” 

She looked into his face with quiet despair, never 
dreaming with what a pang her last words struck 
home. Marmaduke winced beneath them. Perhaps 
the recollection of his own broken vows in some 
subtle way increased his sympathy for this helpless 
being, although the vows that she was on the verge 
of being tempted to break had been taken for her by 
another and not by herself. He knew that very soon 
they must be interrupted, and that if she ever made 
her escape her lot would be the harder for her having 


THE DANCE OF THE BAYADERES. 191 

been known to concoct it with a Christian. He 
therefore spoke rapidly, while pretending to admire 
the gems with which her neck and arms were lavishly 
adorned. 

“ I am rich. In my own country I would have 
some influence, and riches may not be entirely with¬ 
out influence here. If an opportunity occurs for you 
to leave the pagoda, without your flight being ob¬ 
served, come to me.” Here he gave her his name 
and described to her the location of his house, which 
she recognized when he mentioned it as the property 
of the prince from whom he had rented it. 

“ There,” he continued, “ you will at least be safe, 
since the priests cannot take you by force, until I can 
find some means to help you to your native home. 
You will have plenty to eat, a roof to cover you, 
nothing to fear. The only thing wanting is oppor¬ 
tunity. For when you come—or rather, if you come 
—I should like to send my servants away for the time, 
in order that no one may see you enter.” 

“ There will be an opportunity to-morrow night,” 
said the girl with breathless rapidity. “ There will 
be a festival in the garden of one of the neighboring 
palaces,” and she designated one within half a mile 
of Marmaduke’s. “We are expected to attend. If I 
can come, I will do so sometime between evening and 
midnight.” 

“Will you, then, trust me?” 

She looked up into his face with childlike frankness. 

“ Entirely.” 

“ Your name ?” 

“ Adwe.” 

“ There is a small gate that opens into the garden, 



192 


THE LADY OF CAWNPGRE. 


on the eastern side, near the river. No other gate is 
there, so you cannot miss it. The path that goes by 
it is lonely and unfrequented. No one will be about 
but myself. I will wait until midnight. Good-bye.” 

He stole softly back to the other guests. The spell 
of the siesta was full upon them. He applied himself 
to the hookah, which up till now he had neglected. 
His hurried interview with the gentle bayadere already 
seemed like a dream. The proposition he had made 
had escaped him without his being wholly respon¬ 
sible. It was as though he were under the inspira¬ 
tion of a loftier being, whose will transcended his 
own. Presently the deadening influence of the hour 
began to steal over him. A slight commotion behind 
the curtains betokened that the bayaderes were awak¬ 
ening from their stupor, and were about to depart; 
but he heard them not. He, like the other guests, 
was in that dreamless repose which is as near an ap¬ 
proach to the coveted Nirvana as earth will allow. 

It will be readily understood that when Marmaduke 
returned to his palace, in the cool of the evening, he 
was in a very different frame of mind from that in 
which he had left in the morning. He did not repent 
the step he had taken; but as the enchantment of the 
moment wore away, he realized how surely he had 
laid himself open to misinterpretation when the girl’s 
place of refuge became known, as it surely would, 
sooner or later, and what difficulties he must be pre¬ 
pared to encounter if he persevered, as of course he 
would persevere, in his efforts to shield her. In think¬ 
ing of these matters a new train of ideas perforce 
took possession of him, and he felt his pulse beating 


THE DANCE OF THE BAYADERES. I93 

with an excitement and anticipation he had not 
known for months. 

In the hope that no unforseen obstacle would arise, 
Marmaduke granted leave to all his servants, the next 
evening, to attend one of those frequent festivals— 
more than forty are annually celebrated in Benares 
alone—which bear witness to the honor in which the 
Hindoos hold their principal deities. In short, every 
member of his household was absent excepting the 
janitor who guarded the front portal. When the last 
ray of sunset had faded, Marmaduke made sure that 
that official was at his post; then, threading the wind¬ 
ing and verdant alleys that conducted to the Ganges, 
he saw Dalpatram kneeling upon the river’s brink, 
absorbed in prayers for the dead. Satisfied that the 
only two pairs of eyes that could possibly watch him 
were otherwise occupied, he took himself to the small 
green postern, on the other side of the garden, of 
which he had spoken to the bayadere. He opened it 
noiselessly and gazed into the darkened pathway, 
prepared to begin a patient watch. The night was 
starry and moonlit, and the sharp radiance, falling 
through the pleached boughs, made a silver reticula¬ 
tion upon the ground. The noise of the crowded 
streets was somewhat dimmed ere it reached his ears 
in this secluded spot. The silence, the suspense, the 
romance, the antiquity, and the superstitions by which 
he was surrpunded, all had their effect upon him. 
He felt himself involved in a whirl of phantom-like 
circumstances, from which there was no escape, and 
ever and anon there rolled over him that bewildering 
■ sensation of strangeness and remoteness which ac¬ 
companies an opium dream. Frequently, tired with 



194 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


watching, he closed the postern and walked a few 
steps away; then, fearful lest he should have failed 
to note the approach of the one for whom he waited, 
he opened it again and peered forth as before. 
Finally, after several hours had thus passed, he saw 
a dark figure approaching rapidly, not along the path 
up which he had been looking, but along the deeply- 
shaded byways near the shore. His heart began to 
beat more quickly as this figure drew nearer and 
nearer. Between the shadows among which it was 
now engulfed and the point where he stood, there 
was an interval of moonlight which it would be com¬ 
pelled to traverse. Upon reaching the outer edge of 
this shadow, it hesitated an instant, and turned about 
as if to retrace its path. Marmaduke stepped out 
into the moonlight. The figure ran, on noiseless 
steps, toward him, and hid itself, frightened and 
trembling, in his arms. He drew it within the 
garden, and closed the gate. 

“ Adwe S Adwe!”he murmured, with reassuring 
voice, placing his hand compassionately upon her 
head. 

She seized his hand and pressed it against her lips, 
her heart, bursting into tears, while still she trem¬ 
bled, like a gazelle that has escaped the tiger’s clutch. 

“Now, indeed,” she exclaimed between her sobs, 
“ I am without caste, without friends, without any¬ 
one but you, unless I can one day reach my native 
home. Do not send me away, unless you can take 
me there yourself. I will serve you, I will wait on 
you. I have no one on earth but you.” 

She clung to him convulsively, with the faith with 
which children cling to God. She almost knelt at 


THE DANCE OF THE BAYADERES. 


195 


his feet, partly from exhaustion, partly because of the 
welling love and gratitude with which she was over¬ 
come. Marmaduke raised her. He had appointed 
himself her rescuer and her protecter, but he had 
thought of nothing more. He was not in love with 
her, and his passions had not been aroused by this 
tender child of the tropic, whom he had snatched 
from degradation, as one would pluck a snowy 
flower threatened with ravage by some base, destruc¬ 
tive hand. But Adwe’s words, and the artless con¬ 
fidence of her caressful pleading, lit up their relative 
positions as by a soft and sudden stroke of lightning. 
Gently he took her by the hand, and murmuring 
words of comfort and kindness, led her to the house. 
With noiseless steps he conducted her to that part of 
it, hitherto unused, which among the Hindoos is 
named the zenana, and is dedicated exclusively to the 
women of the household. There, with his own hands 
he set before her bread and wine, and saw that she 
ate and drank, and was comforted. Then, assuring 
her that she should not be disturbed until he himself 
came to her, he bade her good-night, and with a heart 
which, in spite of him, was strangely agitated, left 
her to repose. 




196 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


CHAPTER XII. 
adw£. 

When Marmaduke awoke in the morning, and 
realized the change which the event of the previous 
evening must necessarily make in his household, he 
felt the pressure of a great responsibility. The pres¬ 
ence of Adwe could not be kept concealed, and even 
could it have been, temporarily, the hour must soon 
come when it would be manifest. It would be neces¬ 
sary to make certain alterations in or additions to 
his retinue, so that she might be suitably waited 
upon, and have her captivity—for so it would vir¬ 
tually be—mitigated as far as possible. 

He did not at first give himself any thought as 
to what steps might be taken by the priests of the 
temple to which she belonged. He knew that trou¬ 
ble in that quarter would ultimately be threatened ; 
but he knew also the power that resided in the police 
regulations of the English officials, and he was not 
aware of having violated any law in extending this 
protection. 

His first care was to visit Adw6, letting himself 
into her apartments by the key which he carried. 
She had evidently been up for some time, for she had * 
that fresh appearance of one whose toilette has 
recently been completed. She greeted him with a 


adw£. 


197 


confiding smile, in which there was a tinge of pen¬ 
siveness. A sense of the entire solitariness of her con¬ 
dition, of her absolute dependence upon him, broke 
over him as she stepped hesitatingly toward him, and 
then, as if in glad response to his outstretched hands, 
ran to him and nestled in his arms with the trustful 
joy of a child. As she thus clung to him he kissed 
her forehead with fraternal fondness, and gazed 
penetratingly into the dark, viotet-tinf'ed eyes, which 
with such artless abandon questioned his own. Who 
shall say precisely what his feelings were at that mo¬ 
ment? What does the mother feel when her first¬ 
born sleeps for the first time in her bosom ? What 
thought comes to the father, when for the first time 
he holds a child of his own in his arms, and reflects 
that in a sense he is responsible for all its future ? It 
was with emotion not wholly unakin to these that 
Marmaduke touched with his lips the beautiful low 
forehead that leaned against his shoulder. For Adwe 
had none of the meretricious arts of the professional 
bayadere. Whatever evil she had learned had been 
kept from blossoming into fruit, by the tragedy of 
her position. She had entered the pagoda at an un- 
wontedly late age. The death of her mother, and 
her severance from home, had been comparatively 
recent. She had as yet known no other love than 
that which children feel ; and whatever bargaining 
there may have been between priests and rajahs for 
her possession, she had remained in ignorance of it 
up to the moment of her flight. 

As he had done the night before, so, at this early 
morning hour, Marmaduke brought her, with his 
own hands, one of those simple meals which to the 




THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


198 

European would imply starvation, but which are 
quite sufficient for the unexacting Hindoo appetite. 
While she was eating he made up his mind what he 
would do, and at the conclusion of the repast he 
asked her to write, of course in Hindoostanee, a paper 
setting forth that she had been consecrated to the 
vocation of bayadere contrary to her desire and will, 
and that she requested the protection of the laws in 
the asylum she had voluntarily chosen in the house¬ 
hold of the American, in order to withdraw from the 
authority unjustly exercised by the Brahmins. 

This done, he prepared to leave her, but at her 
frightened, hesitating, and timid look, he returned 
again to her side. Her air of desolation, as he had 
arisen to depart, completely melted him, and her 
joyous smile when he lingered and came back was 
equally captivating. He could compare her manner 
to nothing else than that of the gazelle—that timid, 
modest, and gentle creature, so human in its tender 
winsomeness that one searches its eyes in quest of a 
soul. 

“You will not send me away?” she asked, in her 
melodious language. 

“ Send you away ?” he answered reassuringly. His 
voice was caressful. He could not make it other¬ 
wise. She had taken one of his hands, and held it 
between her own. 

“I will work for you,” she continued. “I will be 
your servant. I will draw water for you from the 
Ganges at the foot of your garden. I will do what¬ 
ever you command. If you should send me away, no 
one would have anything to do with me henceforth. 
Even the pariahs would turn their back on me. I 


adyv£. 


199 


should fall so low that to get food to eat I should be 
compelled to wash the corpses that are taken to the 
banks of the Ganges to be burned ; and in order to 
cleanse myself of the impurity, I should be doomed, 
after my death, to be born over and over again, 
'through a thousand generations into the body of a 
jackal.” 

Marmaduke looked at the beautiful young creature, 
pervaded by this fantastic belief, as tragically serious 
to her as though its proof had been demonstrated. 

“ I will never send you away,” he replied gently, 
“ unless it is to your own country, which I shall make 
sure you can reach in safety.” 

“ My own country ?” 

There was no mistaking the wistfulness of her 
eyes. They dwelt upon Marmaduke. Her own 
country, where perhaps there were few or none upon 
whose affection or aid she could depend, had now be¬ 
come of little importance to her. Marmaduke was 
her benefactor, her savior. He almost shrank from 
the innocent admiration and devotion with which her 
face was eloquent. 

“ Yes, it is possible I might be safe there,” she con¬ 
tinued, “if I could ever succeed in reaching it. But 
even there, if the Brahmins pursued me, they would 
say to everybody: ‘ She was consecrated to the ser¬ 
vice of Siva. She ran away from the sacred sanctu¬ 
ary, under the protection of a stranger.’ ” 

“ We will not anticipate trouble,” answered Marma¬ 
duke, in the same reassuring voice, wavering between 
his desire to behave with kindness, and his unwilling¬ 
ness by look, or tone, or gesture to express more than 
the deep compassion by which he had been actuated 


200 i'l 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORK. 


when he first saw Adwe in the midst of the other 
bayaderes. He found it very difficult to maintain 
the exact equipoise. In spite of Adwe’s artlessness 
and childishness, it was next to impossible that she 
should ascribe to him merely the beneficent pity of 
an unimpassioned philanthropist who wished to do 
her good ; while at the same time it remained quite 
clear to himself that he wished to appear in no other 
light. He sat down beside her and explained briefly 
the plans he intended for her comfort and safety. 

His household at that time consisted of nearly 
twenty servants, a by no means large number, in the 
East, for even a less liberal menage. The embarrass? 
ing distinctions of caste make themselves felt in 
Hindoostan, as much among the lower as in the 
higher orders, and consequently the duties that ap¬ 
pertain to one servant are never transacted by any 
other. The invariable reply that awaits a master 
who has this expectation is : “ My caste forbids my 
doing anything else than what I am engaged for.” 
If, therefore, an employer loses his hostler, his horses 
remain unfed and unattended to until he has provided 
himself with a substitute. When he sends away his 
gardener his garden goes to ruin if he allows a long 
while tq pass without replacing that factotum. So 
through all the departments which relate to the keep¬ 
ing of his mansion and estate. If the proper servant 
be missing, he will either have to do the work him¬ 
self, or to see it left undone, and to abide the result 
with such equanimity as he can muster. It will be 
perceived, then, that the difficulties of domestic ser¬ 
vice are not confined to Europe and America, where, 
in the average household, the cook will sometimes 


adw£. 


201 


condescend, on a pinch, to transact some of the chores 
that rightly belong to the domain of the chambermaid, 
or where the chambermaid herself, during the tempo¬ 
rary invalidism of the cook, can be persuaded to boil 
an egg or oversee the toast. Marmaduke’s retinue 
included a superintendent, called a dobochy, who at¬ 
tended to all the househould purchases, engaged the 
other servants, and maintained a general surveillance 
of their ingoings, outgoings, and behavior ; a valet 
de chambre ; a Mussulman tailor; a French cook ; a 
porter, who may be described as literally a hewer of 
wood and a drawer of water; a lamp-lighter and 
cleaner ; a coachman and two assistants ; two men 
whose office was to keep vibrating, night and day, 
the huge punkahs, or fans, which hang from the ceil¬ 
ings in tropical countries ; a gardener ; a bath-attend¬ 
ant ; and several palanquin-bearers. 

As he sat talking to Adwe it suddenly struck him 
that it would be necessary gradually to get rid of 
these servants, almost all of whom were Hindoos, and 
to surround himself with Mussulmans only. The 
reason for this was that the Hindoos would naturally 
sympathize with the Brahmins from whom Adwe had 
escaped, and their fidelity could not be depended 
upon. Mussulmans would be devoid of such sym¬ 
pathy, and amid such an environment he could more 
reasonably hope to guard against treachery. He 
mentioned this thought to Adwe, and was delighted 
at having done so when he noticed the look of grati¬ 
tude which sprang into her eyes. The change, how¬ 
ever, could not be made instantly. It would have 
to be effected slowly, from day to day. Fortunately 
the extremely debairched and demoralized condition 




202 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


in which some of the servants had returned from the 
merrymaking in which they had indulged the pre¬ 
vious evening, furnished him with a legitimate excuse 
for effecting a part of the change at once. As these 
cases had not been reported to him by the dobochy, 
but were accidentally discovered by himself, he was 
thus provided with an unassailable reason for dis¬ 
missing that functionary, and securing a Mussulman 
to reign in his stead. 

These alterations occupied his mind, as, taking 
leave of Adwe, he left the palace, carefully immuring 
her as before, and carrying the key of the zenana in 
his pocket. His first care was to engage an ayah or 
femme de chambre, to place at the service of Adwe, 
and two seamstresses to ply the needle as might be 
expedient in providing her with a suitable outfit. He 
then paid a visit to an English judge to whom he had 
been introduced by Mr. Loveridge, and whom he had 
had occasion to consult more than once when some 
technical points had arisen in which his rights as a 
foreign resident were concerned. This gentleman 
had lived in India not less than thirty-five years, and 
Marmaduke therefore awaited his opinion with con¬ 
siderable concern, after handing him the deposition 
which Adwe had written. 

The judge read this brief document twice. 

“ So far as the law is concerned,” he said, “ you 
have nothing to fear. If any attempt is made to take 
the girl away, either by force or fraud, the law will 
protect her and you. She has an undoubted right to 
leave the service of the temple and the society of the 
Brahmins, if she so choose. The only punishment 
that can legally be inflicted upon her is one with 


adw£. 


203 


which the law has nothing to do. It consists in native 
public sentiment, which condemns her, just as, in 
Christian countries, public sentiment condemns the 
priest and the nun who break their vows. But of 
course the English law and the English police can 
promise only that which is within the limit of their 
power. There are some things from which they can¬ 
not promise to protect you.” 

“Such as what?” asked Marmaduke, wondering 
what was next to come. 

“Treachery, stratagem, chicanery, manoeuvring, 
snares, traps, pitfalls—any device, however unex¬ 
pected and devilish, that can place the girl once more 
within the hands of the Brahmins, or, failing in that, 
place both her and you beyond all human reach.” 

“ Is the case as desperate as that ?” 

“ It is indeed. I have lived here for more than a 
generation. No instance of precisely this kind has 
yet come to my knowledge ; but I have known of 
many instances in which death has been brought 
about by vindictive Brahmins, in such a manner that 
the guilty parties remained undetected. If you will 
consult our police registers, you will frequently 
come across the words ‘Accidental death.’ This 
generally means that some European, who had, 
justly or unjustly, incurred the hatred of the Brah¬ 
mins among whom he dwelt, was found dead in his 
bungalow, and that no other explanation than the 
one I have given you was ever discovered.” 

“ But by what means are such deaths brought 
about ? ” 

“ Generally by poison. The vegetable productions 
peculiar to this climate abound in terrible poisons, 


204 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


which entail certain and speedy death, but the pres¬ 
ence of which science is not always able to detect. 
The Brahmins will of course discover the where¬ 
abouts of the girl. Unable to gain possession of her 
by legal means, their vengeance will never sleep. It 
will be directed toward you as well as toward her; 
and, as I said before, against this secret vengeance 
the law can afford you no protection. I can, how¬ 
ever, give you some advice, which may prove useful. 
Do not go out in the evening without being well 
armed, and be very careful in regard to your cook.” 

Here Marmaduke told the judge of the changes he 
intended to make in his menage. 

“ That is well,” said the judge. “ It is, in fact, the 
best thing that you can do. Retain, however, your 
English or French cook. You will then be making 
assurance doubly sure.” 

After a few more words on both sides Marmaduke 
left, realizing more than ever the immensity of the 
responsibility he had assumed, and the greatness of 
the change that had come into his existence. 

There now began for Marmaduke a life so strange 
that had it been revealed to him by a sage when he 
was in the most credulous period of ardent and ro¬ 
mantic youth, he would have rejected it as savoring 
too strongly of the wildly fantastic. In spite of the 
changes he made in his household, of which the 
reader has been apprised, everything, for a while, 
proceeded so tranquilly that it might have been fan. 
cied no cause for dread or suspicion existed. The 
portion of the house occupied by Adwe and her at¬ 
tendants had been sumptuously furnished when the 
Rajah had lived in the palace, and had been left by 


ADWE. 


205 


him much as it was then. Into it Marmaduke im> 
ported a great deal that was delicate and beautiful 
in European art and American manufacture and in¬ 
vention, and in a short time its suite of rooms and 
the little garden-enclosure adjoining them, consti¬ 
tuted an abode where a woman of far greater intel¬ 
lectual and artistic culture than Adwe would have 
found abundant resources. Thither Marmaduke re¬ 
paired, at odd hours, during the day and evening. 
He was seized with the idea of cultivating this tropic 
wild flower which had so strangely been thrown- at 
his feet. He had already made considerable progress 
in Hindoostanee. In daily converse with Adwe his 
improvement became very rapid, and as he advanced 
he perceived, more and more clearly, the depth and 
breadth of her natural intelligence. Occasionally 
her remarks were so clever and so deep that he 
glanced at her in amazement, and was reminded of 
what Jonson says about Shakespeare—that he was 
naturally learned, and needed not the spectacles of 
books. It seemed to be thus, to a certain extent, 
with this young girl. Her intuitions and her quick 
perceptions often outran that book-knowledge which 
is gained so slowly and applied so mechanically. 
The deeply affectionate nature behind all this assisted 
her in divining his desire to see her different from 
what she was, while retaining all those inborn allure¬ 
ments that made her irresistible. Her soul began to 
grow without her being aware of it, and the more 
freely he spoke to her in her own language the more 
eager she showed herself to reach some degree of 
proficiency in his. Their often repeated interviews, 
became, therefore, a mutual education, and it was not 




20 6 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


a great while ere she learned to hold a conversation 
in English upon commonplace subjects, and even to 
lead a little in words of one or two syllables. 

The penetrating reader at this point will ask two 
questions. One is, Why did Marmaduke not use the 
first opportunity of transporting her to Bhotan, her 
native province? The other is, What is the state of 
feeling with regard to her, into which he was gradu¬ 
ally drifting? It is not our intention to evade either 
of these questions. Both are legitimate, and the time 
has now come when they may be fully answered 
without anticipating matters. 

For some days following his interview with the 
judge, Marmaduke had weighed with himself the ex- 
pedienc}' of travelling with Adwe as far as Bhotan, 
and placing her, with his own hands, among such 
relatives and friends as he might there discover. But 
often as he mentioned this plan to Adwe, he saw the 
shadow lengthen on her face—a shadow which did 
not effect him less for the meek immediacy of her 
acquiescence. From the first moment he had spoken 
to her in the pavilion of Rajah Suraj Singh, she had 
felt the spell of a most refined, ardent, and unique 
personality, different, very different, from any that 
she had ever met, heard of, or dreamed about. It 
was this which had inspired her with instantaneous 
confidence, and made her willing, upon the moment, 
to trust her fate to him. It is safe to say that had 
he been an old, or an elderly man, of no matter how 
great sanctity, she would have refused to place her 
hand in his, even had the chance of safety been 
greater. Perhaps it is also safe to say that had Mar¬ 
maduke, in any respect, been other than what he 


adw£. 


207 


was, there would have been wanting that magnetism 
of physique, not less than soul, which made her more 
truly his slave, than if he had purchased her with 
thousands of rupees. This sensuous admiration was 
the next thing to that adoration which a passionate 
young girl often has for a young man who is her 
superior in birth, education, intellect, position, and 
worldly fortune, particularly when these advantages 
are united with a lofty peculiarity of temperament 
and spirit which sets him apart from the rest of the 
world, and makes him seem to be fashioned of finer 
clay. It was inevitable that something of this senti¬ 
ment should escape her, in spite of that reticence in 
which her natural modesty wrapt her during her 
conversations with him; for though it was impossible 
for her to view her relations to him as a girl of his 
own nationality would have done, under similar cir¬ 
cumstances—had such been possible—her natural 
coyness and reflectiveness stood her in good stead in 
her ignorance of the conventionalities of Christen¬ 
dom. At the same time this modesty and thought¬ 
fulness were but the clothing of a burning, impulsive, 
and effusive nature. They begirt as the soft green 
clasps begirt a pink and swelling bud, which strains 
them in the effort to break into perfect flower. 

Every time, therefore, that Marmaduke spoke of 
this problematic journey into Bhotan, he felt the 
negation which lingered at the bottom of Adwe’s 
plaintive eyes, and he began to feel, in time, an 
equally strong negative asserting itself in his own 
heart. What? SJiould he abandon this brand, which 
he only just succeeded in plucking from the fire? 
With whom could he leave her in Bhotan ? With 





THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


208 

her friends and relatives? And who were they? 
Poor and ignorant people, as she had told him, in 
answer to his queries, who would be quite unable to 
provide for her comfort and protection. Besides, he 
could not leave Benares with Adwe without their 
joint departure becoming generally known. The 
Brahmins had swift and peculiar methods of com¬ 
municating with each other throughout the length 
and breadth of Hindoostan, and it could not be cer¬ 
tain, however remotely Adwe might be placed, that 
they would not one day regain possession of her, 
w r ere she left without adequate protection. And if 
they did regain possession of her, what would be her 
fate? Marmaduke shuddered to think, even though 
it should prove nothing worse than what it would 
have originally been had his eyes never fallen upon 
her. A rajah’s favorite, for a few brief months, she 
would have passed from one to another, until, a post¬ 
graduate in the school of debauchery, with nothing 
left to learn or practice in the curriculum of volup¬ 
tuousness, she met the fate of all these votaries of 
the temple—became a decrepit ex-bayadere, initiating 
the young into the vices they were to organize into 
a profession; or perished, prematurely old, and had 
her body, half consumed by funereal fire, thrown to 
the jackals and vultures; or her ashes scattered to 
the winds if the fire did the work so ruthlessly as to 
leave nothing but those ashes to bear satiric witness 
to her beauty. 

And Marmaduke ? He was living in a country and 
a clime where everything conspired to provoke the 
senses and incite their gratification. He was divorced 
from the religion in which he had been educated, and 


ADWg. 


209 


disappointed in his pursuit of the philosophy by 
which he had hoped to ultimately replace it. He 
had suffered as much as any man could, in dread of 
one of the most appalling of human calamities, which 
had not yet, indeed, come upon him, but which never, 
during one waking hour, released him from its shadow. 
The love this clinging and dependent being had for 
him clove through the middle of his heart, and filled 
him with a sort of fiery pathos, one of the sweetest 
and balmiest emotions he had ever experienced. 
When he had first given his protection to the girl, 
he had thought of nothing but her escape and wel¬ 
fare. His feelings had partaken of the paternal or 
fraternal, but they had partaken of nothing else. 
He had not paused to think that Adwe would regard 
him in any other light than a benefactor and well- 
wisher, who disinterestedly desired to rescue her from 
a degraded and repellant life, and rehabilitate her by 
returning her to the station whence she had. been 
taken. But as the days passed, nothing became more 
evident than that she did not thus regard him; and 
before he knew it he found himself held by numerous 
invisible threads, so strong that they could not be 
severed without his doing as much violence to him¬ 
self as to them. 

It will be asked whether this love which was creep¬ 
ing into his heart—this love scarcely more perceptible 
than the shadow of a blade of grass cast by a star— 
was gradually supplanting the memory of Beatrice? 
No. But there are some masculine natures which, 
virile in all the essentials of manhood, are under the 
necessity of loving, and when deprived of the select- 
est object of their affection, send forth passionate 



210 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


and yearning tendrils that instinctively seize and 
enfold such secondary loveliness as may come within 
reach. Marmaduke’s nature was one of these. He 
had been happy beyond measure in that paradise of 
the future which he was to inherit with Beatrice. 
Without committing a sin he had been ousted from 
that paradise more relentlessly than Adam was from 
Eden, with this additional misery, that he had had to 
leave his Eve behind. Events had so plotted together 
that he was forced to seem despicable in the eyes of 
one whose esteem he coveted more than that of any¬ 
one else in the world, and through all the remainder 
of his life no cure for this condition was to be found. 
Most young men, situated , as he was, would have 
committed every excess, and placed it all to the 
account of latent irresponsibility. He had resisted 
whatever temptation he had felt to do this. He had 
experienced all the depth of what good Mr. Loveridge 
would have conscientiously described as “ the misery 
of forsaking God,” but he had not made such misery 
the excuse for finding pleasure in the saturnalia which 
awaited him on every hand in the voluptuous dens of 
Benares. Beneath the sweet, warm, refreshing love 
of Adwe, he felt as some wretched outcast might feel, 
who, taken from frozen streets and lashing sleet at 
midnight, is placed on downy cushions before a glow¬ 
ing fire and given wine and food; or as some parched 
traveller might feel who, wandering over the simoomed 
desert, stumbles across the edge of an oasis in time to 
slake his thirst at its cool springs. 

Many weeks had passed in this way, and still the 
tranquillity remained so uninterrupted that Marma- 
duke almost threw aside his fears, and congratulated 


adw£. 


2 11 


himself that the priests had made up their minds to 
take no active measure, either secret or manifest. 

One evening, about ten o’clock, he was alone with 
Adwe in her apartment. Among its furniture was an 
American piano, which he had purchased especially 
for her behoof, and in which she took the greatest 
interest. Though not an accomplished musician, he 
had some skill upon the instrument, and often afforded 
her immense pleasure by playing or singing simple 
melodies. There was one, in particular, she was 
never tired of hearing, the tune, and the sentiment 
(which she had learned sufficient English to under¬ 
stand, especially after his explanation of it) precisely 
echoing the gentle and wistful unrest that was never 
absent from her heart. Has the reader ever heard it ? 
It was Paolo Tosti’s beautiful song: “ Forever and 
Forever.” 


I think of all thou art to me; 

I dream of what thou mayst not be; 
My life is filled with thoughts of thee 
Forever and forever. 

My heart is full of grief and woe; 

I see thy face where’er I go; 

I would, alas, it were not so 
Forever and forever. 

Ah ! No ! I would not bear the pain 
Of never seeing thee again. 

Of wandering over land and main 
Forever and forever. 

Ah ! leave me not to dream of thee; 
For joy or grief, whiche’er it be, 

Oh, be as thou hast been to me, 
Forever and forever. 




212 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


Perchance if vve had never met 
I had been spared this vain regret. 

This endless striving to forget 
Forever and forever. 

Perchance if thou wert far away 
Did I not see thee day by day— 

I might again be blithe and gay 
Forever and forever. 

Ah ! No ! I would not bear the pain 
Of never seeing thee again, 

Of wandering over land and main 
Forever and forever. 

Ah ! leave me not to dream of thee; 

For joy or grief whiche’er it be. 

Oh ! be as thou hast been to me, 

Forever and forever. 

Marmaduke always sang this song with great feel¬ 
ing. Its simple words forcibly brought before him 
the image of Beatrice, and his voice at the time 
seemed to be intended less for the lonely girl who 
was thirstily listening, than for his own heart. This 
evening, as he concluded, he paused for a moment 
before turning away from the piano, for every inci¬ 
dent connected with his parting from Beatrice rose 
vividly before him, like a picture illuminated with 
ghostly light. As he paused, his fingers on the keys, 
his head slightly bent, in mournful resignation to the 
vision, he heard a stifled sound near by, and turning 
round saw Adwe standing within a foot of him, 
sobbing violently. The clear Indian moonlight, fall¬ 
ing in its cool silver blaze through an open window, 
distinctly allowed the drooping outlines of her ex¬ 
quisite form to be seen. Instinctively Marmaduke 
sprang toward her, and clutched her in his arms. 


AD WE. 


2I 3 


He sank upon the nearest chair and held her upon 
his knee. She clung to him like a frightened child, 
who had found assurance and rest, and putting her 
arms around his neck, laid her cheek against his. 
The unspoken sorrow of each made them one at that 
hour. He was mourning for a love he had lost, and 
she for one she had not gained. He was pining for 
one he should never see again; she for one whom any 
moment might take from her. 

“ Tell me, Adwe,” he exclaimed, straining her to 
his heart, kissing tenderly her brow and eyes, and 
finally, in vague agitation, touching her lips with his, 
“ What is the matter ? Why do you cry? What do 
you fear ? Do you fear the Brahmins ? * 

“No—no,” answered Adwe, repressing her sobs. 
“There is only one thing on earth that I fear now.” 

“ And what is that ? ” 

“To lose you—to lose you ! ” she exclaimed, again 
clinging to him, with that artless simplicity which 
completed the conquest she had made without know¬ 
ing it—a conquest which could not have been at¬ 
tained by every combined grace and fascination with¬ 
in the compass of design. And to his amazement, 
she repeated in English, with a delicious accent that 
added to the plaintiveness of the words : 

“ * l think of all thou art to me ; 

I dream of what thou mayst not be ; 

My life is filled with thoughts of thee 
Forever and forever.’ ” 

He could only exclaim “ Adwe ! Adwe ! ” and fold 
her closer in his arms. A strange thrill, which seemed 
to proceed from within, radiated through him. It 



214 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


was a thrill not alone of the nerves, but of the soul. 
It was so delicious to find himself so rapturously 
loved. He felt as a soul in hades must feel who finds 
an angel nestling in his bosom, and charming away 
the fangs of fire and the sting of despair. 

“Those are the sweetest lines, of all,” murmured 
Adwe, “ excepting these,” and she repeated softly: 

** ‘ Ah ! leave me not to dream of thee ; 

For joy or pain, whiche’er it be, 

Oh • be as thou hast been to me, 

Forever and forever.’ ” 

“Are there no other lines as sweet?” he asked, 
shivering slightly with the tremor that comes of 
knowing that one is limitlessly loved. 

“‘Perchance,’” whispered Adwe, 

“ * Perchance if we had never met 
I had been spared this vain regret, 

This endless striving to forget 
Forever and forever.’ ” 

“Perhaps it would have been better, Adwe,” he 
answered, stroking her hair, while the words seemed 
wrung from him, “ perhaps it would have been better 
had we never met.” 

“Ah, no! no! exclaimed Adwe, perceiving the 
meaning hidden beneath his words, and returning to 
her native tongue in which she expressed herself 
gracefully. “ I could never suffer so much, now, as 
to regret having met you. I can say, with the song 
‘ My heart is full of grief and woe ’ at the thought of 
ever losing you. I can say ‘ I see thy face where’er 


adw£. 


215 


I go.’ But I cannot say ‘I would, alas, it were not 
so ; ’ for I had rather suffer and remember you, than 
be glad and forget.” 

Her sweet vibrant voice died away in a tremble, 
as she hid her face in his neck. Deeply agitated with 
this suddenly affirmed passion, which existed in his 
own despite, what could he do but hold her there in 
silence ? Presently she raised her head and continued: 

“ Still less could I say : 

“ ‘ Perchance if thou wert far away 
Did I not see thee day by day— 

I might again be blithe and gay 
Forever and forever.’ ” 

“ Ah, no ! Adwe would never be blithe again— 
never again, forever and forever ! ” 

In the long caress that followed, the fraternity of 
Marmaduke’s affection disappeared, never more to be 
revived. Sitting there, in that almost midnight mar¬ 
riage of moonlight and shadow, with all the hum¬ 
drum realities of commonplace life removed to an 
infinite distance, a gorgeous flower, like a large red 
rose in marvellous bloom, seemed gradually to 
emerge before him. Its passionate perfume over¬ 
powered and enervated him. The gay birds that 
flashed around it fell fainting at its root, and its vol¬ 
uptuously velvet petals overlapped each other as 
though revelling in one another’s odorant splendor. 
The thought flitted through his brain, Were it best 
to pluck a flower like that, and rejoice in the private 
possession of its beauty, or to watch it awaiting its 
fate upon its stem, slowly fading until its leaves lay 
shrivelled under foot, or stricken down by the storm 


216 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


and trampled upon by every passing beast of burden? 
But he was in too confused and excited a state to 
follow out the analogy and argument thus vaguely 
shadowed. He was holding close against his heart 
the only being in the world who loved him, the only 
being to whom his love was capable of bringing hap¬ 
piness. Yet, even in the hour of intoxication, he 
could not bring himself to practice anything like 
deception on a creature so innocent and helpless. 

He whispered something gently in her ear. She 
started slightly, then sat up, and said in an humble 
voice, that still quivered with accents of love : 

“I never expected or desired, I never dreamed of 
anything like that. I am your servant—your slave. 
I belong to you. What rajah could buy from me 
that which I give to you ? Our bodies can be bar¬ 
gained for, but not our souls. I do not know the 
customs of your country. I do not care to know 
them. Love me in your own way, in your own time 
—only love me. Never send me from your heart, 
even though some day you should be compelled to 
send me from your home.” 

“ My little Adwe. Dearest little one.” 

He repeated in a low tone the substance of that 
which he had whispered to her. It related to the 
fact that his father’s will incapacitated him from 
marrying, but did not touch, even remotely, upon 
the reasons, as set forth by Dr. Billington. But be¬ 
fore he had proceeded far, Adwe stopped him by 
placing her finger gently against his mouth. 

“I do not want to hear all this,” she said, with the 
tender wilfulness of a loved child, who knows how 
far it may go without being chidden. “ I do not 


adw£. 


217 


want to hear it unless it eases you to tell. I have 
watched you when you never thought I did, and I 
know there is something in your heart too sad even 
to be told. Therefore I do not wish you to tell me. 
It is something you can never forget ; it is something 
you can never get over. Perhaps some day, when you 
are dying, if I am near you, then, j^ou will tell me. 
Then I shall be glad to know. I am no longer any¬ 
thing. I am scarcely a human being. I am lower than 
the pariahs—lower even than the lowest among them, 
who are despised by their own caste. I am not worthy 
even to love you ; and if you let me love you, I am so 
low that I should be glad to be allowed to love, hop¬ 
ing for none in return. If you should die to-night 
I would ask nothing better than that it might be in 
my arms, if only your last word could be that you 
loved me a little. Then, to-morrow, the priests 
might come, but they could not force me back to 
their pagoda. I would kill myself beside you, where 
you lay dead, and wander for a thousand years in 
darkness, consoled by the recollection that you, the 
beautiful stranger, my deliverer, had loved me, and 
that some day we should meet again.” 

There could be no reply to this within the power 
of words to give. There could be only that inartic¬ 
ulate rapture expressed by broken sighs and linger¬ 
ing caresses and those soft undertones and inter¬ 
jections which belong rather to the utterance of the 
dumb than to coherent speech. 

After a little while Adwe raised her head. 

“Do you remember,” she asked, “ the air which 
the musicians played when you first saw me dance ?” 

He remembered it well, that wild barbaric air, now 




2 18 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


swelling into mad phrenetic cadence, now dying away 
into melting trances, according to the steps and 
poses of the bayaderes. Adwe had often sung it to 
him, until, adapting it to the piano, he had given to 
it a measured melody which it had not had before, 
without sacrificing an iota of its fantastic grace. He 
had often played it for his and her delight, and once 
or twice had asked her to dance, that he might watch 
her as he played ; but she had declined with a coy 
shake of the head, and a change of color with which 
bashfulness had something to do. But now, rising, 
she persuaded him to the piano, and said: 

“When you see the light shine through the wall 
there, begin to play, keeping your eyes fixed on the 
wall, and you will see something to surprise you.” 

She pointed to a low wall of pink marble, that ex¬ 
tended, like a screen, across one end of the apart¬ 
ment. This wall was pierced by one small door, at 
the extreme side, and divided the room in which he 
sat from a covered courtyard which led into a private 
garden beyond, and contained in its centre a fountain 
and a tank. In the tank and beneath the fountain, 
it was often Adwe’s pleasure to bathe, in the early 
morning, or in the afternoon when waking from the 
siesta. From the roof of the court-yard depended a 
chandelier, which shed a brilliant light, further aided 
by candelabra upon the opposite walls. The pink 
marble screen to which we have referred was only an 
inch in thicknesss, and had the singular character¬ 
istic of being so transparent that when a strong light 
fell upon it, a hand held between it and the light, 
could have its shape fully discerned upon the other 


ADWl 


219 


side—a circumstance whereof Marmaduke was wholly 
unaware. 

Not understanding Adwe’s request, but willing to 
oblige her, he seated himself at the piano. In 
another instant she had disappeared behind the door 
at the side of the screen. He waited a few moments, in 
curious expectation. Suddenly the courtyard beyond 
became flooded with radiance. Adwe had lighted 
the chandelier. From the moon-touched darkness in 
which he sat, he could see the pink marble screen 
glow like a sheet of tinted paper upon which no 
speck was visible. Remembering his promise, he 
began to play, his eyes fixed upon the screen. After 
the first few introductory bars, a human shadow 
stole slowly out of the glade of light, and imaged 
itself upon the wall with extended arms and inviting 
throat. The shadow moved according to the flight 
of his fingers over the keys, and the dance of the 
bayaderes, in all its rapturous and mocking passion, 
phantomed itself before him in delirious arabesque. 
His heart leaped to the wild music born beneath his 
hands, and his blood danced in keeping to Adwe’s 
every motion. His eyes were riveted upon that 
delicate expanse of pink, where the poetry of desire 
was silhouetted by a shadow, the exquisitely hidden 
painter being herself the picture that she limned. 
He had asked Adwe to dance, and she had declined ; 
but he had never conceived of anything so subtly 
alluring and so piquantly refined, as this poem of the 
senses, revealed to eyesight though veiled from 
touch. The sensitive modesty of Adwe proved more 
provocative than the sorcery of the most accomplished 
siren. 



220 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


“Adwe! Adwe!” he cried, jumping from the 
piano, and rushing toward the illuminated wall in a 
fever of excitement. He lost a few moments in 
opening the door, from which the handle had been 
broken. During these moments the lights were put 
out, and when he entered the courtyard he found 
himself in a mosaic of moonlight and shadow, and 
heard only the lonely plash of the fountain as it rose 
and fell amid the shallow tank. 

“ Adwe ! Adwe !” he called again. No sound re¬ 
plied, but he caught sight of a gleaming figure dis¬ 
appearing amid the mangoes and pomegranates of 
the garden. Eagerly he ran in that direction, and 
there, amid the lush orient landscape and the mys¬ 
terious murmurs of the aromatic night, he planted 
upon her lips his first kiss of hungry expectation, and 
received her first unresisting and irresistible response. 


ECCE HOMO. 


221 


CHAPTER XIII. 

ECCE HOMO. 

The first exclusive and complete possession of one 
who is beloved, begets an ecstasy that is unique in 
the soul’s experience. In the case of Marmaduke it 
proved a balm and a refreshment he had not deemed 
possible; and those who are inclined to think harshly 
of him must remember the very exceptional circum¬ 
stances that surrounded him. Again and again he 
had reviewed the argument which had deliberately 
led him to separate himself from Beatrice, and he 
could perceive no flaw in the several links. He had 
chosen the only means he could possibly have chosen 
whereby to set her free, and her own happiness 
demanded that he should use those means. Shut 
out during the rest of his life from such enjoyment 
as usually becomes the legitimate expectation of 
young men blessed with health and wealth, who look 
forward to marriage and domestic bliss, he had en¬ 
countered, in the most unexpected manner, and 
without seeking it, an affection of the most generous 
and lavish kind, that asked only to bask in his smiles, 
and held in utter indifference those conventionalities 
of custom by which alone, in western civilization, 
such ties are rendered reputable in the eyes of the 
world. He was living among a people by whom the 
link which bound him to Adwe was regarded as a 




222 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


veniality so slight as scarcely to call for condone- 
ment, and he was gradually becoming acclimatized 
to a latitude where the passions expressed themselves 
with all the ardent affluence found in its flora and 
fauna. He had endeavored to live the life of the 
student and ascetic until assured, on unimpeachable 
authority, that the progress he had hoped to make 
was quite impossible in the span of one human life, 
and casting about for some refuge from himself he 
had suddenly incurred a responsibility the full mean¬ 
ing and temptation of which he had not paused to 
weigh. The responsibility had gradually increased 
from day to day, without its meaning growing 
clearer; and he had begun to yield to the temptation 
before acknowledging to himself that the temptation 
was there. It vras only after he had yielded that its 
full significance stood unveiled before him, and he 
felt himself an extremely human being, committed to 
a pathway from which he did not know how to re¬ 
cede even if he had had the wish. That portion of 
his temperament which had been hitherto sup¬ 
pressed, now asserted itself with a violence at which 
he stood amazed. The delicate speculations of the 
emaciated student crumbled away into nothingness, 
and the transports of sensuous realities awoke in 
their place and burned with energetic fire. 

If the causes which had impelled Marmaduke to 
flee to India could have left him suspectible to happi¬ 
ness, he would have been happy now. If Beatrice 
had been removed from him by death it is possible 
he might have found a temporary consolation in the 
devotion yielded to him by Adwe, and in that devo¬ 
tion to her which, in a certain sense, was necessitated 


ECCE HOMO. 


223 


in return. If Beatrice had proved faithless and 
unworthy, it is conceivable that in time he might 
have encountered some other woman upon whom to 
lavish the highest love of which he was capable. 
But the peculiarity of his affliction was that, though 
guiltless, he was compelled to bear with him a feel¬ 
ing akin to what a man guilty of faithlessness might 
experience. It would be wrong, however, to say that 
his love for Adwe was such as arose wholly from the 
gratification of the senses. Her gentle spirit was at 
once earnest and questioning. She evinced a natural 
intelligence which needed only contact with a trained 
intellect, like his, to produce the best results. Her 
education therefore, passed into his keeping. He 
had the rare satisfaction of watching her mind and 
soul expand, and of knowing that she drew all her 
nature from him. He was the sun, the wind, the 
rain, the dew, the atmosphere, the very earth from 
which this human flower obtained its generous nutri¬ 
ment. 

Under his care she improved in English rapidly, 
and learned to read with facility. Her hands wan¬ 
dered to the piano, and she took pleasure in the in¬ 
struction he gave her from time to time. Every 
week made her more of a companion to him, and 
frequently the greater part of the twenty-four hours 
was passed alone in her society. His character and 
intellect were, to her, like an immense labyrinthine 
landscape in which she was forever discovering some¬ 
thing new; while, on the other hand, he found, in her, 
heights of thought and depths of sentiment which 
gave him an entirely different impression from what 



224 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


he had previously had concerning the oriental 
woman’s potentialities. 

One day he brought down into the part of the 
house occupied by Adwe a small trunk containing 
some English books which he thought might prove 
useful to her. He had just opened the lid and re¬ 
moved a few of the volumes, when word w r as brought ^ 
him that a visitor had called. The visitor had with¬ 
held his name, and bestowing upon Adwe one of 
those tender caresses without which he never left 
her, now, he went from the zenana and repaired to 
the reception-room. As he entered it a certain mis¬ 
giving—why, he could not explain—mingled with the 
amazement and pleasure with which he saw the tall 
and majestic form of Halkar Zemindra. 

Their first greetings over, Zemindra bent his eyes 
—those eyes which saw, rather than searched—upon 
the young man, and said: 

“ I had hopes, before I parted from you, that you 
would continue those inquiries in which you seemed 
interested. But just before I left—as I think I inti-, 
mated in my hasty note—I foresaw you in certain 
relationships of which, at that time, you had no idea. 

In other words, I was perfectly convinced that those 
studies, if undertaken, would not be very long pur¬ 
sued. May I ask if I was in the right ?” 

Marmaduke colored slightly. He felt that Zemin¬ 
dra was perfectly aware of every important event in 
his life since they had last seen each other. He also 
felt a certain degree of culpability in not having 
pushed his studies with ascetic rigor, even should 
they not have borne the early fruit he had expected. 
He was not s however, disposed to be taken to task. 


ECCE HOMO. 225 

even by Zemindra; so gazing fixedly at nim, he 
merely said in reply: 

“My studies are, for the time, suspended. I am 
supported by neither religion nor philosophy. I am 
simply a man full of weaknesses and passions. I have 
suffered as few human beings suffer. I wish to forget 
as much as possible, and to snatch what little happi¬ 
ness I may as I pass through life—as I make what 
Renan calls ‘an excursion through realities.’ ” 

Zemindra smiled. It was the same old smile of 
august compassion. At the same time there was 
nothing offensive about it, nothing that betokened 
conscious superiority. 

“ I do not wish to pass any judgment upon you,” 
he replied. “ I would not, for anything, assume the 
role of censor. But you will bear with me while I 
make a brief quotation from a book which in your 
youth you were taught to reverence. ‘No man, hav¬ 
ing put his hand to the plough, and looking bapk, is 
fit for the kingdom of God.’ ” 

Marmaduke smiled bitterly. 

“There is no kingdom of God, in the sense in which 
you mean,” he answered. “ We are as much in God’s 
kingdom now as we ever shall be. Time is simply a 
limited portion of eternity, and place a limited por¬ 
tion of space.” 

“ But think,” replied Zemindra, “ what you have 
lost. Think what you might have gained had you 
continued unswervingly upon the path you marked 
out for yourself. The road was straight and nar¬ 
row, like that which the Christian Scriptures tell you 
conducts to the kingdom of heaven. It is true that 
not in this incarnation would you have made the 


226 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


progress your spirit craved. The conditions did not 
admit of that. But think what a foundation your 
self-discipline would have made for the next incar¬ 
nation. All that has now been lost. You will never, 
in this life, be able entirely to regain the ground; no, 
not even if, from this instant, you foreswore what 
has become so dear to you and returned to the stud¬ 
ies and the austerities which were gradually becom¬ 
ing a second nature to you. And why? Because 
these several appetites, which until lately had been 
kept in abeyance, have been allowed to gain the 
upper hand, and they will not down again at the 
word of command. Besides,” he continued, as he 
observed that Marmaduke listened without endeav¬ 
oring to interrupt him, “ it is not in the least likely 
that you will abandon this pleasant course which 
you have begun. The chances are that you will pur¬ 
sue it to the end. But at what a cost! You will 
have to learn in another incarnation the lesson you 
have failed to learn in this. You will have to forego 
all the advantages you had begun to acquire.” 

“What would you have me do?” asked Marma¬ 
duke, with an assumption of humility, which, how¬ 
ever, did not in the least deceive Zemindra. 

“ I will tell you,” answered that singular being. 
“ But you will not do it. Dismiss the bayadere 
whom you deliberately helped to escape from avoca¬ 
tion to which her dying mother devoted her. You 
will say that chivalry and honor, and notions such as 
these, render it incumbent on you still to extend her 
your protection. But you forget that in the first 
place you had no right to assist her in defying an 
authority which was entirely legal, and that in the 


ECCE HOMO, 


227 


second place the kind of protection which your pat¬ 
ronage of her has now become is not sanctioned by 
the code of morality in which you were educated. 
Your first duty is to save yourself, if I may adopt, for 
the moment, the language used by your Christian 
missionaries, such as Mr. Loveridge ; afterwards you 
may try to save the souls of others. In other words, 
it is your duty to place youself as perfectly as possi¬ 
ble in harmony with the laws of the universe by 
making the number of your re-incarnations as few as 
may be, and this you can do only by leading, in each 
incarnation, as perfect a life as possible. Are you 
leading that sort of life now ? Is the girl’s life with 
you materially better than that which she would 
have had as the inmate of a pagoda or the favorite of 
a rajah? Or,—” 

“ Much better in every way,” answered Marmaduke, 
interrupting for the first time ; and perceiving that 
Zemindra was in fact entirely acquainted with every 
detail of his career since his arrival in India. “ You 
know, indeed, a great deal about me, but you are in 
ignorance of a great deal more. If you understood 
perfectly why I came here, why marriage is denied 
me, why I was compelled to forego marriage with 
one dearer to me than life, you would also compre¬ 
hend why I discover so small an amount of evil in 
my relations with a most unfortunate young woman 
whom I esteem and love more than most men do 
their wives, even in civilized lands. Neither she nor 
I am to be judged by ordinary standards. Enough 
that I rescued her from a life that filled her with 
loathing and wretchedness, and have provided her 
with one in which she finds happiness, respect—re- 




228 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


spect from myself, I mean—and content. From the 
note you left me previous to your departure from 
London for Brindisi, I gather that you are under the 
command of a master. May I ask who and what the 
master is that commands one so far exalted, even 
above illustrious intellects, as Halkar Zemindra?” 

“My master?” answered Zemindra, the gentle 
smile with which he had listened vanishing, and his 
eyes assuming that far-off look they wore when any 
question arose that transferred his thoughts to dis¬ 
tant scenes or epochs. “ It would be in vain for me 
to describe him, for you would not believe in his ex¬ 
istence. He dwells far from here. He is older than 
I, yet so perfectly has he retained his youth and all 
the strength and freshness that belong to it, that he 
appears younger. It is my comfort to reflect that the 
powers he once possessed, ages ago, were no greater 
than yours or mine, but that, by following the blessed 
path, he has, through many incarnations, evolved fac¬ 
ulties that make him now appear almost more than 
human. And yet, at present he is only a human be¬ 
ing ; in that respect like you and me. This is prob¬ 
ably his last incarnation, but it is my hope still to 
meet with him in ages to come, though then, as he 
superintends the affairs of one of the thickly popu¬ 
lated planets with which the firmament is filled, he 
will still be as far beyond me as he is beyond me now. 
Would you like to see his portrait ?” 

Marmaduke gave eager and interesting assent, and 
Zemindra produced from his girdle (for he was at- j 
tired in the Hindoo costume) a thin velvet locket 
which he unclasped. Holding it before him, Marma¬ 
duke saw the features of a man apparently not more 



ECCE HOMO. 


229 


than thirty years of age, though Zemindra informed 
him that the real age was fifty. The general expres¬ 
sion very much resembled that found in the popular 
portraits of Christ, with the exception that it was 
more severe. The hair, beard, and moustache were 
black ; the face was a long oval ; the brow was sur¬ 
mounted by a native head-dress ; the eyes were re¬ 
markable for a look which denoted—to Marmaduke, 
at least—an habitual observance of interior workings 
behind exterior manifestations. At the same time 
Marmaduke noticed an intensification of that expres¬ 
sion which he had remarked in Zemindra—an intel¬ 
lectual compassion rather than an emotional sym¬ 
pathy, a pity born of the intelligence rather than a 
loving-kindness proceeding from the heart. But 
neither pride nor passion was detectable in that re¬ 
markable face. It was the countenance of one medi¬ 
tating upon the interests of solar systems, instead of 
the petty environments of his next-door neighbor. 

Marmaduke handed the portrait back with a re¬ 
pressed sigh. 

‘•We go our different ways,” he said. “If your 
views of the government of the universe be true, I 
shall be taken care of in a manner unforseen by me, 
until I, too, reach the Nirvana to which we are all 
tending.” 

“To which we are all ultimately tending,” inter¬ 
posed Zemindra. “ But there are some who deliber¬ 
ately violate duty, and who, having reached a certain 
point of goodness, deflect, and go down and down. 
They never regain, in any future incarnations of that 
cycle, what they have lost in this life, but become 
lower and lower, and baser and baser, until, reaching 






230 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


a point oeyond which there is nothing worse, they 
are compelled to re-begin a series of incarnations—a 
series which forms another cycle, and through a dura¬ 
tion, which, to our mortal vision, seems almost limit¬ 
less, until finally they learn the lesson they them¬ 
selves have so long delayed.” 

“ You refer to me,” answered Marmaduke, who had 
felt Zemindra’s eyes turned upon him, and looking 
into them saw them beaming with a light more 
nearly affectionate than any he had seen there before. 
“ I have nothing to say in reply but that I am doing 
the best I can under the circumstances, and that such 
results as must come will have to come, be they what 
they may, and I shall have to bear them as best I can. 
But tell me this: What am I to expect of the Brah¬ 
mins? Sooner or later, will they avenge the step I 
have taken ?” 

“ I am not a Brahmin,” returned Zemindra. “ Per¬ 
sonally I am not interested in the matter at all. I 
may say this much, with perfect certainty, however. 
The Brahmins will never forget the outrage of which 
they consider you guilty. They will be sure to resent 
it, if possible, in some vigorous manner, sooner or 
later. I cannot help you if I would. It is unpleas¬ 
ant to me to add that I would not help you if I could, 
and yet, in fact, it is most true. For I would not 
dare to interfere with that particular form of retribu¬ 
tion which you are unquestionably about to incur.” 

Marmaduke hesitated. He had that sense of the 
pretentious and absurd which pervades the western 
mind when it is brought face to face with the incred¬ 
ible and fantastic claims made by a certain school of 
oriental philosophy. But the personality of Zemin- 


ECCE HOMO. 


* 3 I 


dra impressed him, and these last words had the tone 
of prophecy. Still, he would not ask him to lift the 
veil hanging over the future. He was indisposed to 
yield that much to the implied powers of any human 
being ; and mingled with this was perhaps a certain 
t dread borne out of the affection inspired by Ad we. 

“ And now farewell,” said Zemindra, extending his 
hand. 

“And when shall I see you again?” 

“ Never,” answered Zemindra, in a cold but gentle 
voice, “ never in this life. In any of the many which 
succeed to this, we may occupy the same house, the 
same room; we may be bosom friends, or sworn 
enemies; we may even have changed our sex, and 
governing empires from palaces, or immersed in ap¬ 
propriate occupation by washing the floors of a 
prison, we may be in close communication yet never 
dream that we have met before. Farewell.” 

“ But,” said Marmaduke, detaining him, amazed at 
this strange doctrine, “ you spoke of progress—ad¬ 
vancement ?” 

“You have but to read your own Herbert Spencer 
to understand that everything is rhythmic. So far 
he is right. Nothing progresses in an unbroken 
straight line. I may have done deeds in this incarna¬ 
tion,” here his fine countenance grew clouded, for a 
moment, “which will render it impossible for me to 
fill, in the next incarnation, a place corresponding to 
my highest hopes. Evil deeds I have forgotten will 
have to be worked out to their results. And it is not 
for me to say whether the best place is not the palace, 
the prison, or the hovel. There came to me once the 
vision of a large, dusky man, a negro, writhing in 


232 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


mental agony in a garden flooded with moonlight, at 
midnight—a lonely garden full of flowers of every 
perfume and hue. Such visions have their meaning, 
though we may not know it. They are projected 
before us, upon that inter-atomic ether which fills all 
space, as intimations of futurity. That dark-skinned 
man, writhing in the beautiful, unpitying moonlight, 
at the recollection of unexpiated sin, may be I—may 
be you. I go to meet my destiny with a courageous 
heart, sure that, whatever may await me, I have 
reached a certain height which I shall re-reach and 
surpass in another incarnation, not far off, how great 
soever be the declension or retrogression, between 
this and then, as a consequence of former guilt. And 
that height re-attained, I shall go on, until all my in¬ 
carnations flit before me, like apparitions that thrill 
with their beauty or terrify with their despair, and, 
recognizing myself in each, I part from them forever, 
and pass the threshold of Nirvana’s bliss. Again 
farewell.” 

He extended his hand mechanically, his rapt gaze 
fixed upon the distance, and Marmaduke realized for 
the first time the absoluteness of the faith in which 
Zemindra’s peculiar religion can plunge its votaries. 
Suddenly Zemindra withdrew his look from the re¬ 
mote point on which it was set, and regarding Mar¬ 
maduke, fora moment, with solemn benignity, pressed 
his hand gently and strode rapidly away. 

Marmaduke remained motionless for a moment, 
oppressed by the sadness and singularity of this fare¬ 
well. Then, making a strenuous effort to shake off 
the gloom which had fallen upon him, he returned to 
the apartment where he had left Adwe. 


ECCE HOMO. 


233 


She was kneeling before the trunk in which he had 
brought down the books. On entering, he had drawn 
aside the curtains noiselessly, and she did not per¬ 
ceive him. He was struck by her attitude, and did 
not at first observe the object at which she was gaz¬ 
ing so intently. Sunk on her knees, her body was 
thrown back, her hands were clasped before her, her 
head was slightly elevated, and her eyes were fixed 
with profound curiosity and interest upon something 
which evidently stood facing her upon a small table 
whose marble slab was on a level with her chin. 
Noting her extreme abstraction, Marmaduke bent 
slightly forward, and then saw that her looks were 
riveted upon a small crucifix which he now remem¬ 
bered to have packed away in the trunk, along with 
a little biblical literature. The crowded experiences 
of the last few months had caused him to forget this 
incident, and now he found himself unreasonably 
dismayed and disconcerted by the tender interest and 
solicitude he read upon Adwe’s face. 

She started as he came forward. 

“ Who is it ?” she asked, pointing to the crucifix. 
“ Do they punish wicked men that way in your coun¬ 
try ?” 

He felt himself changing countenance beneath her 
questioning eyes. All at once there rose before him 
the picture of the Church of St. Remigius, with all 
its holy and tender associations, where he had 
preached the gospel, and administered the sacra¬ 
ments, and where he had led at least one soul to the 
Christ whom he had forsaken. A rush of wild 
regret swept over him, to get back the peace and 
innocence and happiness of those vanished days. 


234 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


Adwe, looking at him, perceived that her question 
had started painful recollections, though she could 
not imagine how. 

“ Never mind,” she said, pulling him gently down 
to her side, so that they remained kneeling together 
before the crucifix. “ Tell me some other time. 
Only I could not understand why they should put 
upon a criminal a crown of thorns.” 

“Oh! Adwe! Adwe!” he exclaimed in a husky 
voice, putting his arm around her, and feeling an in¬ 
explicable compassion for her pagan ignorance, 
“ that is not a criminal. That is the Christian’s God.” 

“ A god ?” exclaimed Adw6, opening her eyes wide 
in wondering simplicity.” 

“The Christian’s God.” 

“ Then he is your god ?” 

Marmaduke did not reply, and Adw6, taking his 
silence for affirmation, continued : 

“ But if he is a god—” 

“Not a god— the God,” interrupted Marmaduke. 
“ The one only living and true God.” 

“ How can that be ? If he is a god, how can he be 
a man ? Why do they put him to death ? Why 
does he not prevent it? What has he done to de¬ 
serve it ? And whether he deserves it or not, why 
does he not hinder it ?” 

“ Adwe, He is greater than Siva, greater than Brah¬ 
ma, greater than Buddha. And yet He died upon 
the Cross that the world might be saved.” 

“ That the world might be saved ?” 

It was a new idea to Adwe, and had all the at¬ 
tractiveness of a story she had never heard. Lean¬ 
ing her head upon his shoulder, she sought his eyes 


ECCE HOMO. 


2 35 


with that pleading look in which there was always a 
touch of adoration and reverence, and murmured : 

“ Tell me all about it.” 

He sat down beside her, and there, with the crucifix 
between them, in that strange, semi-barbaric room, 
with denotements of heathendom on every hand, 
told her the story of the Cross as he had told it 
years ago in the Church, in the Sunday-school, in 
hospitals, in missions, at the death-bed of tardy peni¬ 
tents, in the benumbed ears of hoary sinners. She 
listened with all the eagerness of a child listening to 
fairy lore. Fascinated anew by her rapt attention, 
he told her, sometimes in the simple English that she 
had learned to understand, sometimes in her native 
tongue, how God so loved the world that He gave 
his only begotten Son, that whosoever believed in 
Him might not perish but have everlasting life. He 
told her about the decree of Herod, and the star in 
the east, and the wise men visiting Bethlehem with 
their gifts of gold, and frankincense, and myrrh ; 
about the preaching of John, the baptism of Jesus, 
the descent of the holy dove, and the voice from 
heaven saying, “This is my beloved Son.” And 
still, as he paused, watching the effect upon her, she 
clung to him, and repeated: 

“ Tell me some more.” 

He passed on to the fasting and the temptation in 
the wilderness, the sermon on the mount, the choos¬ 
ing of the apostles, the parables and miracles, the 
transfiguration, the entrance into Jerusalem, the be¬ 
trayal by Judas, the last supper, the agony in the 
garden, the denial by Peter, the trial before Pilate, the 
remorse of Judas, the scarlet robe, the crown of 


236 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


thorns, the march to Golgotha, the crucifixion, the 
two thieves, the last cry of the soul that felt itself for¬ 
saken, and the final yielding up of the spirit. He de¬ 
scribed how the veil of the temple was rent in twain^ 
and the graves were opened, and the earth was shaken ; 
how the sacred body was buried by Joseph of Arima- 
thea; and how on the third day the dead Christ 
arose, and disclosed Himself to Mary Magdalen, and 
afterwards to the disciples, before ascending to heaven. 

To all this Adwe listened with parted lips and 
wondering eyes ; and when the leading events were 
thus rapidly sketched, and the whole story of the 
life, resurrection, and atonement, had been outlined, 
she exclaimed, in a whisper: 

“ Is it true ?” 

Marmaduke knew not what to answer. He could 
not tell her that it was all a myth, made up of nu¬ 
merous traditions, originating no one knew how, 
gathered no one knew by whom, and accumulating 
impulse as they were transmitted to us through the 
centuries. He could not tell her that they were true 
and acknowledge that they had no bearing or in¬ 
fluence on his own belief or conduct. He paused, 
greatly perplexed, looking into her bright face, 
shadowed by the thoughts and emotions created by 
that wondrous tale. But his own feelings had been 
stirred during the recital, and rising, as if by blind 
impulse, he seated himself at the piano, and playing 
the appropriate accompaniment, sang : 

Just as I am,—without one plea, 

But that Thy blood was shed for me. 

And that Thou bid’st me come to Thee, 

O Lamb of God, I come. 


ECCE HOMO. 


237 


Just as I am,—and waiting not 
To rid my soul of one dark blot, 

To Thee whose blood can cleanse each spot, 

O Lamb of God, I come. 

Just as I am,—though tossed about 
With many a conflict, many a doubt. 

Fightings and fears within, without, 

O Lamb of God, I come. 

Just as I am,—poor, wretched, blind; 

Sight, riches, healing of the mind, 

Yea, all I need, in Thee to find, 

O Lamb of God, I come, 

Just as I am,—Thou wilt receive, 

Wilt welcome, pardon, cleanse, relieve, 

Because Thy promise I believe, 

O Lamb of God, I come. 

Just as I am,—Thy love, unknown, 

Has broken every barrier down ; 

Now to be Thine, yea, Thine alone, 

O Lamb of God, I come. 

At the conclusion of the first verse Adwe crept up 
to his side, and lingered there until he had finished. 
The simplicity of the language and his distinct enun¬ 
ciation enabled her to catch every word. 

“ How beautiful ! How beautiful !” she exclaimed, 
as the last notes of the plaintive melody died away. 
“ But what is meant by ‘ the Lamb of God ?’ ” 

She still held the crucifix in her hand. He took it 
from her, and holding it up, answered : 

*• The Lamb of God is the Saviour of the world; and 
the Savior of the world is Jesus of Nazareth ; and 
Jesus of Nazareth is the Son of God.” 

“ How beautiful ! How beautiful!” repeated Adwe, 





238 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


in a tremulous murmur. “ How I should like to have 
a faith like that! What do good people in your 
country do, who want to believe, but cannot ?” 

The tears rushed to his eyes. She put her arms 
around him in tender distress, as he answered in 
broken voice : 

“ They say: * Lord, I believe; help Thou mine un¬ 
belief.’ ” 


Many hours passed. It was midnight. All was 
silent throughout the palace. Between the open 
windows of a sleeping apartment wandered the cool 
breeze which often stirred at that hour. The star¬ 
light and moonlight that flooded the city was of that 
rich and clear quality found only in the East, and 
acquired still greater vividness from the masses of 
black shadow everywhere projected. Along the 
street, amid one of these masses, crept a man’s figure, 
until it stood just beneath a window of the bed-room 
we have mentioned. Then, with energetic movement 
and well-directed aim, it lifted its arm, and hurled 
inside the window two black masses of indistinguish¬ 
able shape, and fled with speed away. 

That which was thrown fell in a distant corner of 
the room where Marmaduke was sleeping. The noise 
startled Adwe, who had fallen into that semi-uncon¬ 
sciousness which precedes perfect slumber. She 
aroused herself and listened. A sound, at once gut¬ 
tural and hissing, smote her ear. A shudder ran over 
her body. Thinking rapidly for an instant—and in 
that instant the condensed arguments that lurk in the 
impulses shot like lightning through her brain—she 


ECCE HOMO. 


239 


turned to Marmaduke and pulled him gently by the 
hair. He started up. 

“ What is it ?” he cried, in that momentary wildness 
which doctors call sleep-madness, often the result of 
being awakened suddenly from sound repose. 

“ Do not move,” she whispered. “ Remain here, 
motionless, beside me, or both of us are lost.” 

All the dread which he had constantly in mind 
where Adwe’s safety was concerned, reasserted itself 
with double force. He passed his arms around her 
protectingly. 

“ What is the matter ?” he whispered. “ No one 
shall take you from me.” 

“ Ah !” she murmured, in a voice of horror, “ some¬ 
thing is in this room more powerful than the Brah¬ 
mins. The cobra-capellas are here.” 

“ The cobra-capellas ?” 

At mention of that terrible snake, whose bite means 
death, he shuddered as Adwe had done. They felt 
their blood turn cold, and clung to each other as if 
for warmth. 

“ Just now,” continued Adwe, “ I saw something 
thrown in at the window—two objects, one precisely 
like the other. They are open sacks containing cobra- 
capellas. There must be at least one hundred at 
present in the room. To move, to try to escape, is 
to invite certain death. We can only remain perfect¬ 
ly still.” 

“ A hundred cobras ?” repeated Marmaduke, stupe¬ 
fied. “What does it mean ?” 

“ It means,” answered Adwe, in a whisper, scarcely 
audible, “ that the vengeance of the Brahmins has 
begun.” 




240 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


CHAPTER XIV. 

MOTHER AND DAUGHTER : FATHER AND SON. 

Most girls, upon being abandoned by their be¬ 
trothed, would be led by impulse, as well as by a 
feeling of pride, to present to the world a cheerful 
and indifferent front. The ordinary novel and play, 
when it delineates a woman’s behavior under such 
circumstances, paints her as entirely impassive be¬ 
fore everybody, excepting, perhaps her mother or a 
bosom friend. Or if impassiveness is not aimed at, 
then the gaiety of indifference or of escape from a 
disagreeable thraldom, is accepted as the proper 
thing. But when Beatrice Orme revived from the 
swoon into which she had fallen, after Marmaduke’s 
confession; when she realized that the dreadful words 
she had heard spoken were the deliberate utterances 
of the man to whom she was prepared to yield all 
that an immaculate woman has to yield, various 
phases of mind supervened, which the average girl 
of the period would have been quite unable to com¬ 
prehend. 

In the first place, as soon as she could recover suf¬ 
ficiently to think connectedly, as well as to feel with 
that moderated intensity which is compatible with 
consciousness, she found herself entirely devoid of 
that burning indignation that is commonly accepted 
as the leading emotion of a woman scorned. She 


MOTHER AND DAUGHTER : FATHER AND SON. 241 


moved in the midst of a deep wonder, as the leaf that 
has lost its first brightness sways in the atmosphere 
by which it is stirred. Her amazement was probably 
as profound as that of the devout Christian would 
be, if any being were to demonstrate to him, beyond 
the shadow of a doubt, that immortality was a delu¬ 
sion, the resurrection a myth, and Christ merely an 
historical character obscured by ridiculous traditions. 
A part of the foundation upon which her belief in the 
goodness of God stood, seemed to be swept away 
from her, and she experienced that frightful feeling 
of insecurity which comes to one when an earthquake 
dislodges the solid rocks which are the emblem of 
constancy, and sports with the everlasting hills as 
though they were houses made of cards. She would 
as soon have believed that her own mother would 
turn against her, as that Marmaduke should have 
shrunk from marriage on account of a poverty he 
had not the courage to face. 

To this wonder there gradually succeeded an in¬ 
credulity. She told herself that some reason must 
exist which unimaginable circumstance had led Mar¬ 
maduke to keep to himself, but which would absolve 
him, if told. She argued that if such were not the 
case—if human beings were so constructed that we 
could, with reason, place as much faith in their good¬ 
ness as we do in the goodness of God, and yet find 
such faith wholly unwarranted by the facts—then 
life was an emphatic deception, a curse and not a 
blessing. The refuge of her hope was that something 
inexplicable remained behind. 

But as time passed, and she tortured herself in 
vainly imagining what that something could be, she 



242 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


asked herself over and over again whether it might 
not really be the case with Marmaduke, that, accus¬ 
tomed from infancy to every delight that wealth 
could yield, he had not found it impossible to forego 
that privilege, and whether he had not acted wisely 
and courageously in treating her with entire frank¬ 
ness. She tried to convince herself that he had be¬ 
haved in a thoroughly manly and justifiable way, so 
that she might esteem him still, and find some ratifi¬ 
cation of the gentle feelings that yet lingered in her 
breast. It was impossible for her to forget the ten¬ 
derness of his manner and the refinement of his 
beauty, so unique among men ; and all those secret 
thoughts of him, which were the most exquisite that 
had ever crept into her heart, still came trooping 
there, without being relentlessly turned forth, simply 
because she could not bring herself to believe in his 
entire, absolute, and unrepenting guilt. 

But if this was the attitude of Beatrice, far differ¬ 
ent was that of her mother. All the affection which 
Mrs. Orme had entertained for the young man, now 
turned into the bitterest hatred. If she had chosen 
to descend to the depths of the English language, 
she would probably have found no epithet which 
she would have deemed too base to apply, but she 
contented herself with employing every term which 
a lady might, without loss of self-esteem, allow to 
pass her lips. This vituperation she would have con¬ 
tinued, had she not been at once silenced by her 
daughter. After Mrs. Orme’s first few expressions 
of ire, Beatrice plainly told her that she desired to 
hear no more ; that all denunciation and, in fact, all 
mention of Marmaduke must cease ; and that, for a 


MOTHER AND DAUGHTER: FATHER AND SON. 243 

time at least, all reference to the subject must drop. 
Beatrice spoke too earnestly and decidedly for Mrs. 
Orme to refuse to pay heed, even had she not been 
led to acquiesce through her overwhelming affection 
for her daughter. 

Had any other man, at that time, asked Beatrice 
to become his wife, it would have been quite as im¬ 
possible for her to accept him as it would have been 
impossible for her to foresee that the conduct which 
now separated her from Marmaduke would come in¬ 
to being. Pique was the very last motive that would 
have animated her ; and so far from being ashamed 
of having loved a man whom she had every reason 
to deem unworthy of her, she took no pains what¬ 
ever to assume that artificial behavior meant to imply 
that contempt or indifference has supervened. She 
suffered as only those can understand who have 
passed through a similar crisis, but she had a vast 
quantity of that admirable pride which leads one 
not so much to concern one’s self with concealing 
one’s suffering from the world, as to occupy one’s 
self with ordinary life duties, as conscientiously as 
possible, indifferent to the world’s perception and 
gossip. 

Thus it happened that after Mrs. Orme and Beat¬ 
rice left Mrs. Mincer’s, their lives flowed on as tran¬ 
quilly as ever, varied by such incidents as are found 
at a somewhat quiet watering-place. They had 
chosen Richfield Springs, and there, at one of the 
smaller hotels, they had rooms that looked out upon 
the pleasant enclosure of sward where the baths and 
springs abound, and commanded a view that, if not 
absolutely exciting, was never uninteresting and 


244 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


dull. There they spent their days as people must 
who have few ties and interests which demand great 
mental or moral activity. The charming walks and 
drives found in the heart of that beautifully land¬ 
scaped region, gave them all the refreshment they 
were capable of receiving, and they lent their pres¬ 
ence to most of the entertainments, short of the balls 
at the large hotels, which diversified the evenings. 
There was not the slightest approach to happiness on 
the part of either mother or daughter. A great 
misery had fallen upon them, and no alleviation had 
presented itself, or was likely to present itself. The 
gentle melancholy that ordinarily characterized Mrs. 
Orme’s manner—and it characterized her manner 
more than her feelings—somewhat deepened, illumin¬ 
ated, every now and then, by a flash of emphatic 
indignation, as she stole a furtive look at her 
daughter, and remembered all that that “cowardly 
scoundrel” (as she now invariably called Marmaduke 
in her thoughts) had been to them. On the other 
hand a cheerful tone gradually pervaded the bearing 
of Beatrice. It was a. tone which would naturally 
assert itself in the conduct of a woman who has suf¬ 
fered very deeply, but whose generosity of nature, 
not less than her intellect, points out to her that 
seemliness of living imposes obligations which must 
be performed gracefully and sweetly, with smiling 
lips and frownless brow, however much the heart 
may ache. 

Meanwhile, what hopes and fancies came to the 
breast of George Billington, and what was the prog¬ 
nosis his distinguished father made of the disease 
called love with which the young man was afflicted? 


MOTHER AND DAUGHTER I FATHER AND SON. 245 

It will be remembered that in the short note Mar- 
maduke had written the doctor, explaining the reason 
he had alleged to Beatrice for breaking the engage¬ 
ment, he had expressly requested that this confidence 
should be esteemed sacred. 

Whatever faults the doctor may have had—and he 
was mainly accused of avarice and humbug by his 
professional brethren—he w r as too much of a gentle¬ 
man to violate that confidence, and it did not even 
suggest itself to him, seriously, that it would be 
necessary to explain to his son the ground upon 
which Marmaduke’s betrothal had ceased to be a 
fact. Since a gentleman always concedes to a lady 
the right to the first action, in a cancellation of that 
kind, it would be reasonable to infer that Marma- 
duke, in deference to Beatrice, would wish the. world 
to believe that she had ended a relationship which, 
for reasons not necessary to be known, she no longer 
found desirable. When, therefore, father and son 
had had their first interview, after the former’s recep¬ 
tion of this note, Dr. Billington had merely stated 
that the engagement was over; that the reasons were 
private; that they were not dishonorable to Marma- 
duke; and that they were not unconnected with those 
at which the doctor had obscurely alluded in a for¬ 
mer conversation with his son. These preliminaries 
settled, Dr. Billington pointed out to George that, 
the coast being clear, all he would have to do would 
be to make as much use of his advantages as possible. 
Marmaduke had gone, not to return—at any rate, not 
for a long while. The two young men had not met 
previous to his departure. It was as certain as any¬ 
thing could be that never more would there be any 


246 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


communication between the ex-clergyman and the 
girl to whom he was supposed to have proved faith¬ 
less. All that remained for George Billington to do 
was to step in and win her, if possible. 

The question which occurred to both father and 
son was how was this best to be done. The depart¬ 
ure of Beatrice and her mother from the city made it 
impossible to take immediate measures, for it might 
have proved inexpedient to follow them to Richfield 
Springs, even had George or his father known it to 
be their whereabouts—which they did not. Dr. Bill¬ 
ington had not observed woman’s nature so superfi¬ 
cially as to suppose that a girl who had once been 
deeply in love can instantly transfer her affection to 
another man, because the one upon whom she has 
lavished it has proved false. He knew that, in deal¬ 
ing with such a case, time is as necessary as tact. 
He had, indeed, in his conversations with Marma- 
duke, taken the ground that the mother and daugh¬ 
ter who had received him, believing him to be rich, 
would dismiss him when they discovered that mar¬ 
riage would render him poor; but, in the girl’s case, 
he had reckoned upon a variety of motives, among 
which her conviction that she had been deceived, 
and the influence wielded over her by her mother, 
had been prominent. But, allowing for all this, he 
had never counted upon the instantaneous transferral 
of her affection from Marmaduke to George, and he 
knew that, if the latter was to succeed, a great deal 
of patience, which was one of the many good quali¬ 
ties in which George was entirely deficient, would be 
absolutely necessary. It occurred, of course, to both 
him and George, that the address of mother and 


MOTHER AND DAUGHTER : FATHER AND SON. 247 

daughter could perhaps be obtained by inquiring of 
Mrs. Mincer, but it also occurred to them that it 
would not answer to take any step which might 
afterwards be revealed, even by a remote chance. It 
would be infinitely better to allow a future meeting 
to be brought about by accident, or so to manoeuvre 
things that detection, in thus shaping events, or sus¬ 
picion of having attempted it, would be impossible. 
But meanwhile fortune did not provide the wished- 
for means, and no plan that suggested itself to Dr. 
Billington’s by no means infertile ingenuity seemed 
feasible. 

It was while things were in this unsatisfactory con¬ 
dition, and summer was lost in autumn, that finally 
one of those contingencies occurred which often 
make fate look as though she conspired with the 
plotting, unamiable side of humanity rather than 
with the simple and kindly. One afternoon, upon 
returning from his drive through the park, Dr. Bill- 
ington found awaiting him on his desk, in his office, 
a despatch which caused him at once to order his 
valet to pack his valise, while he himself inspected 
his case of surgical instruments which he carried 
With him when he travelled. The despatch was dated 
that day, at Richfield Springs, and requested his 
presence and professional services immediately at 
one of the principal hotels. It was sent by the wife 
of one of the richest citizens of New York, who had 
been staying there for some weeks. The brief fact 
which Dr. Billington gathered from the despatch 
was that Mr. Van Stein—that was the gentleman’s 
name—had fallen down in an apoplectic fit that af¬ 
ternoon, and had shown no signs of returning con- 


248 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


sciousness. Ordinarily Dr. Billington refused to leave 
the city. It may be said that he never did, unless 
the prospective fee was large and certain, or unless 
the patient was so prominent and distinguished that 
the notoriety of administering to him would in itself 
be a paying advertisement. In the present instance, 
all the causes combined. Mr. Van Stein’s fortune 
was so enormous that no physician could be called to 
attend him and remain obscure. It might be said 
of him that he had not only made his own fortune, 
but was the cause of other people’s. Dr. Billington, 
therefore, though he sighed at the thought of leaving 
his luxurious home, and taking several hours’ jour¬ 
ney on a railway, at night, did not hesitate a mo¬ 
ment, but leaving a hasty note to be handled to 
George, as soon as that young gentleman made his 
appearance, he gave a few directions as to what 
should be said to patients who might arrive during 
his absence, and took the next train for Richfield 
Springs. 

Early the ensuing morning the following telegram 
was handed to George just as he was leaving his 
room: 


Richfield Springs, Sept. 15th, 1886. 

Come here immediately. 

Erastus Billington. 

George was not accustomed to imperative requests 
like this. But he knew that his father would not 
have worded himself so laconically, had not some¬ 
thing of the utmost importance occurred. That even¬ 
ing, therefore, saw him at the celebrated watering- 
place. As he alighted at the hotel where his father 


MOTHER AND DAUGHTER : FATHER AND SON. 249 

was staying, the old gentleman met and accosted 
him. 

“ They are here,” said the doctor, mentioning the 
name of the little hotel where Mrs. Orme and Beat¬ 
rice occupied rooms. “ They take a walk through 
the grounds adjoining every morning, in order to 
get the air and drink the waters. You have only to 
throw yourself in their way, properly, and the thing 
is done. Of course it will take a little time.” 

“ Time !” exclaimed the young man impatiently. 
“Three months are lost already.” 

“ Not lost, but gone before,” said the old man, 
with a grin at the ghastliness of his joke. “ Why it 
takes three months to heal a broken leg; you wouldn’t 
have a broken heart mend in less ?” 

The young man glared at the old man, as though 
almost shrinking at the savagery of his sarcasm. 

“ Father, I really believe you are the devil,” he ex¬ 
claimed, linking his arm in the old man’s. 

“ That’s what Dr.- says,” replied his father, 

mentioning the name of a noted specialist. “ He calls 
me The Gentleman in Black in his private correspond¬ 
ence, because I make twice as much money as he 
does. That is what success means, Georgy.” 

“ Success!” exclaimed George. “ I wonder whether 
/shall be successful.” 

“ Certainly. I have been successful in making 
money and reputation. You must be successful in 
making love. Only begin properly.” 

“And when shall I begin?” 

“ To-morrow.” 

“ I will.” 

And on the morrow George Billington began, as 
skilfully as he knew how. 



25 ° 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


CHAPTER XV. 

PUTTING THE MACHINERY IN MOTION. 

On a previous occasion we explained that Mrs. 
Orme’s income was not large. The phrase is indefi¬ 
nite: almost as much so as the term “limited,” as 
applied to revenue. For Croesus, w T ho is capable of 
spending a million dollars per annum without ex¬ 
hausting his exchequer, will declare with reason that 
there is a limit beyond which he must not go, just as 
surely as there is a limit to the resources of his next- 
door neighbor, who dare not exceed a thousandth part 
of that sum. About one-half of Mrs. Orme’s income 
proceeded from the rent of a handsome house on one 
of the streets running east and west, in the upper 
part of the city. The other came from a prudent in¬ 
vestment in government bonds, upon which she al¬ 
ways congratulated herself. She w r as one of those 
many millions of her sex who have no head for busi¬ 
ness, and cannot possibly understand the slightest 
financial details, no matter how clearly they might be 
explained. Her intelligence in money matters w r as 
confined to knowing that if a check was made pay¬ 
able to her order, she must sign her name on the back 
of it, and that if she drew up a draft she must sign 
her name at the foot. That she had any fundamental 
understanding as to why these formalities were nec¬ 
essary, cannot be averred, though she was not with- 


PUTTING THE MACHINERY IN MOTION. 


251 


out information, ideas, and opinions upon other 
matters. She had her own views, for instance, on 
the law of primogeniture, as it exists in England, and 
a man’s right to marry his deceased wife’s sister. 
She would have argued with Mr. Ingersoll himself on 
the folly of agnosticism, and the undoubted personal¬ 
ity of the devil. Her views on ritualism were ex¬ 
tremely pronounced, and she had nothing but pity 
and compassion for those misguided intellects which 
found spiritual comfort in the low church. Dissent¬ 
ers—she stuck to the word—she did not recognize as 
having any religious conceptions worthy of the name, 
and Roman Catholics she relegated to that large body 
of unfortunates who were given over to believe a lie. 
She was a prohibitionist of emphatic type, and be¬ 
lieved in women getting all the rights they could, 
and a great many they could not. She admired Mr. 
Gladstone as a statesman, but thought he might find 
something better to do in his last years than confer¬ 
ring reputation upon novelists. But when it came to 
financial matters, she acknowledged that she was like 
a ship without either rudder or compass, steam or 
sail. 

In this way it came to pass that her money matters 
were always more or less in disorder. Unable to 
superintend them properly herself, she was unwilling 
to delegate anybody else to do it. Beatrice had nom¬ 
inal charge of them—but nominal charge only. It 
would have been well for Mrs. Orme had she given 
her daughter entire legal control of her little treas¬ 
ury, for Beatrice’s eminently practical mind would 
quickly have mastered the essentials, and brought 


252 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


order out of the chaos in which they were continually 
involved. 

On the morning after Dr. Billington’s brief con¬ 
versation with his son, mother and daughter were 
' sitting beneath the trees in the hilly little park which, 
at Richfield Springs, lies opposite the lower end of 
the line of hotels. The mail had recently arrived, 
and Beatrice held in her hand an as yet unopened 
newspaper, the only missive that had come for them. 
It was a New York newspaper of the previous day. 
Every fine morning it was their custom to repair to 
much the same quarter of the park, there to enjoy 
the balmy air, in all its freshness, and read such 
letters and papers as may have arrived. 

As Beatrice opened the newspaper, upon this par¬ 
ticular morning, she uttered a little cry. A para¬ 
graph that caught her attention gave her so sudden 
a shock that she had not time to moderate or repress 
the exclamation. Even as she made it she recollected 
how repeatedly and urgently she had reminded her 
mother about the possibility of this very event, and 
endeavored to persuade her to take in time the meas¬ 
ures necessary for safety. It was now too late to 
avoid explanation, or even to materially temper news 
of the calamity, so that its full import should fall 
gradually upon her mother’s ear. That startled cry 
betrayed her. 

“What is it?” asked Mrs. Orme, giving a look of 
mingled hope and dread. “ Nothing about that—” 
She was about to say “that hypocritical scoundrel,” 
but checked herself in time. “ Nothing about him f” 

“ O mother!” exclaimed Beatrice, giving Mrs. 
Orme a long, mild, patient look, which spoke a 


PUTTING THE MACHINERY IN MOTION. 253 

volume of forbearance, '‘is there no trouble on 
earth but that t Think of one of which I have often 
warned you, for your own sake, to make sure that it 
should not happen.” 

“ What! ” exclaimed Mrs. Orme, in that tone of 
f absolute incredulity with which one greets the actual 
happening of a calamity long foretold, never believed 
in, “ you do not mean to tell me—” She paused, 
unable to find words that would express the misfor¬ 
tune indicated. 

“ Yes,” answered Beatrice, “ it has happened. The 
house is burned to the ground, and the policy of in¬ 
surance expired last month without being renewed.” 
And handing her mother the newspaper, she pointed 
to the column which gave a detailed account of the 
conflagration that had happened two evenings ago. 
From this it appeared that in the absence of the 
family who rented Mrs. Orme’s house, a servant had 
left a kerosene lamp burning, unshaded by a chimney, 
upon a table in an inner room, near some light cur¬ 
tains which served as portiere. A strong breeze blow¬ 
ing through the windows in the adjoining room had 
wafted the curtains against the flame. The fire thus 
engendered had gained such headway that by the 
time the servant ascended from the basement, where 
she had gone, the entire upper story was in flames. 
Engines, of course, were summoned ; but even the 
alacrity of the New York Fire Department cannot 
invariably save property from destruction, and de¬ 
spite the best efforts of the firemen, several houses, 
and Mrs. Orme’s among the number, were almost 
wholly destroyed. 

Mrs. Orme read the account with that blankness of 


254 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


feeling which is sometimes one’s experience upon first 
becoming acquainted with a great misfortune that 
threatens to affect one’s entire future. The propor¬ 
tions are not discovered in all their vastness, and 
the mind refuses to believe that something will not 
interfere, in the shape of a deus ex machina , whereby 
the equilibrium will be restored. Finally she let the 
paper rest idly in her lap, and folding her hands 
over it, looked far off in a dreamy manner and said : 

“ There was an insurance policy.” 

If there is one feature in the behavior of impracti¬ 
cal persons, who are incapable of learning, more irri¬ 
tating than all else, it is the complacent calmness 
with which they endeavor to shift upon others the 
responsibility they themselves have retained without 
performing the duties it involves. Mrs. Orme’s ideas in 
regard to an insurance policy, although she had been 
frequently confronted with the truth in Beatrice’s 
many arguments with her on that subject, were that, 
on once being taken out, it existed to all time,and that, 
whether renewed or not, the company which granted 
it remained answerable for the losses it was intended 
to cover. Beatrice had repeatedly traversed the 
arguments necessary to combat this unique error, 
and saw the futility of further reasoning. She kept 
silent. Luxury was precious to her, for she had been 
used to it in her early years, and it would be very 
hard indeed to curtail the moderate comforts which 
she and her mother had found in Mrs. Mincer’s 
boarding-house. On the other hand, the surpassing 
sweetness which life had held for her during Mar- 
maduke’s brief courtship, and up to the moment 
when he had brought it to so strange an end, had en- 


PUTTING THE MACHINERY IN MOTION. 


255 


tirely departed ; and during the months that had 
elapsed she had sedulously tried to picture herself, 
as the years crept by, gradually becoming a prim 
and quiet woman, the conventional “ maiden lady,” 
with her little romance hidden deeply away, and 
only brought out when she was alone with God, and 
could shed upon it tears unseen. The explanation is 
that she had loved Marmaduke with the one wild 
love that, as a rule, comes but once in a lifetime. It 
mattered not that he was unworthy. It mattered 
not that he had rejected her. It mattered not that 
he had behaved in a manner which, in any other per¬ 
son, she would have called cowardly and despicable. 
She loved him, and that love was a passion as vio¬ 
lent as any ever felt by anybody in whom virtue and 
honor still remained the guiding principles of life. 
In spite of all this, however, her mind was practical 
in its nature, and she had always remained entirely 
alive to the advantages which competency conferred. 

“The company will have to pay,” said her mother 
at last, looking at her uncertainly, as though ques¬ 
tioning what her silence might mean. 

“ It is quite impossible,” answered Beatrice. 
“ The company will not pay, and cannot be made to 
pay. I do not intend to make the slightest reproach 
beyond this : the policy should have been renewed 
last month. I reminded you of it frequently, and 
begged you either to attend to it, or to let me relieve 
i'ou of all these money troubles and empower me to 
attend to them.” 

The tears rose into Mrs. Orme’s eyes. It seemed 
as if she were being taken to task by her daughter, 
and she had never been used to being taken to task. 


256 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


“ What are we to live on ?” she exclaimed with a 
whimper. 

Beatrice was melted in a moment. 

“ We shall have enough to live on,” she answered, 
putting her arms around her mother, coaxingly, as 
though she were the mother and Mrs. Orme a spoiled 
child. “ We shall still have enough to live on, though 
in a very quiet way.” 

“ Haven’t we always lived in a quiet way ?—that is, 
ever since your father’s death. There was a time, 
though you can scarcely recollect it, when we kept 
six or seven servants and horses and carriages. We 
had a brown-stone front on Fifth Avenue, and a 
summer residence on Staten Island. I used to receive 
every Wednesday. We entertained a great deal— 
your father was fond of society—and we gave at 
least one magnificent ball every winter. My dresses 
used to be described in next day’s paper. We had 
a box at the opera and a pew in Grace Church. 
Your father and I used to pass several weeks every 
season in Washington. I used to meet all the rep¬ 
resentatives of foreign governments, and they used 
to pay me compliments in their official dresses. Once 
upon a time I meet a Hindoo gentleman there. His 
name was Mr. Ramassamy. He came from Calcutta. 
He used to be a sort of rajah in his own country, and 
he said I had the most beautiful eyes yes, I was 
handsome in those days. And now it is all over and 
gone, and the house is burned down, and the com¬ 
pany won’t pay, you say, and we are paupers.” 

It was thus that Mrs. Orme rambled on, in a some¬ 
what incoherent manner that was her custom in 
times of affliction. Beatrice was so occupied with 


PUTTING THE MACHINERY IN MOTION. 257 

consoling her, and with making up for her own ap¬ 
parent harshness apropos of the neglect of the insur¬ 
ance policy, that neither of them observed the ap¬ 
proach of two gentlemen along the shaded pathway. 
One of the gentlemen was about sixty. He stooped 
a little, was gray-headed, and wore a Voltairish smile. 
The other was a dashing young man, dressed in the 
quiet height of the fashion, and apparently uncon¬ 
scious of the proximity of the two ladies, from whom 
he was now separated by only a few yards. 

But in fact both Dr. Billington and his son had 
spied Beatrice and her mother afar off, and were now 
bearing down upon them, intent upon making that 
first essay of which the old man had spoken the 
previous evening. 

“What! Mrs. Orme !” exclaimed the doctor with 
well-simulated surprise, as he and his son came op¬ 
posite the bench upon which the two ladies were 
seated. 

Beatrice was at that moment engaged in explaining 
to her mother how they could still manage to live on 
what remained of their possessions. As we have 
previously hinted, Dr. Billington had attended Mrs. 
Orme in one or two slight illnesses, George had met 
Beatrice at receptions, and the four wdre not wholly 
unacquainted. 

“ Oh! Dr. Billington !” exclaimed Mrs. Orme, rising, 
and making no pretence of concealing her agitation, 
“ you have met us in the midst of an overwhelming 
calamity. I am so surprised to see you here, and so 
glad.” 

She was, as a rule, very free-spoken about personal 
matters, excepting, indeed, those which common 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


258 

prudence warned her must be kept hidden. Her 
words now, of course, led to further explanation ; 
and while she was volubly revealing to the doctor 
the extent of her loss, Beatrice handed George the 
paper and pointed out the paragraph. 

It is easy to infer what thought flitted through the 
minds of the old and the young man. The doctor, 
wholly wrapped up as he was in his son, saw only 
the fact that the poorer Mrs. Orme became, the greater 
was George’s chance of success ; for not only was 
George’s present income, derived from his father, 
extremely liberal, but it was notorious that he would 
fall sole heir to Dr. Billington’s large fortune when 
the old man died. The shrewd and cunning leech 
had no impulse to sympathize with Mrs. Orme’s ad¬ 
versity, though the words that left him were very 
plausible and glib. He was used to immense ca¬ 
lamities of all kinds in other people, and as most of 
those which were revealed to him in confidence bene¬ 
fited his own pocket, he was accustomed to regard 
them as not altogether unalloyed evils. George was 
not naturally very sympathetic, and he was intensely 
selfish—his training had made him so. But he had 
chivalrous instincts, and as no scheme of living ever 
presented itself to his imagination into which a 
goodly supply of money did not enter as the one 
sine qua non , he felt something of the generous dis¬ 
may of youth at the adversity into which his friends 
had fallen. At the same time, a spark of pretty large 
size began to burn in his bosom. The poorer they, 
the more apparent it would be that in pushing his 
suit he was animated solely by love. These mingled 
feelings brought something of the ring of genuine 


PUTTING THE MACHINERY IN MOTION. 


2 59 


emotion to his voice, as he returned the paper to 
Beatrice and uttered those expressions of amazement 
and regret which come so fluently to most of us on 
such occasions. The statement having already been 
volunteered by Mrs. Orme, that the policy of insur¬ 
ance had expired, there was no room for anything 
else than a depressed view of the matter. 

“My dear Mrs. Orme,” said the doctor, who could 
be a perfect Chevalier Bayard when he so wished, 
“ there is a proverb which says ‘ misfortunes never 
come single’; but I do not believe it. Like a great 
many other proverbs, it generalizes too much and 
overstates the fact. You and Miss Orme, for instance, 
are looking so well that I am sure both of you have 
sufficient vitality to weather even a greater blow than 
this.” 

“ I should like to believe it,” answered Mrs. Orme, 
the tears again coming to her eyes. “ But I feel at 
this moment as if I needed only one blow more to 
make me quite hysterical.” 

“ Take one of these, whenever you feel that way,” 
said the doctor, extracting a little phial from his vest- 
pocket, uncorking it, and dropping a small, round, 
flat tablet in the palm of her hand. “Let it dissolve 
slowly on the tongue—and keep the bottle.” 

Mrs. Orme did as he requested, and declared that 
she felt better. She had great faith in his nervines, 
and in fact he was famous for them. Those persons 
who range themselves under the banner of Mental 
Healing, and who, it is difficult to believe, are any¬ 
thing else than fools, frauds, or fanatics, as the case 
may be. should take some of Dr. Billington’s tablets, 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


260 

if they are willing to have disproof given to their 
argument that no drug ever affected a human being. 

The little party strolled along together, Mrs. Orme 
leaning on the doctor’s arm with an elegant languor 
which was altogether natural and not unbecoming. 
In her youth she had travelled far and wide, and was 
never without reminiscences to fall back upon when 
other subjects failed ; but just now she was engrossed 
with the destruction of her house, and went on talk¬ 
ing about it to unwilling but patient ears, to the exclu¬ 
sion of every other topic. Beatrice followed, talking 
to George, or rather listening to him. On the few 
occasions when he felt it incumbent upon him to 
make an effort, he could be very agreeable ; and on 
the present occasion it was so pleasant to him to 
make the effort that his manner of speech was 
clothed with the charm of apparent spontaneity. 
The conversation had touched upon the fact that 
while all the watering-places were overrun with 
women, so few men, comparatively, seemed able to 
take a long vacation. 

“Even my father, at his age,” continued George, 

“ is unable to relieve himself of the claims of his pro¬ 
fession. He came here to attend Mr. Van Stein, of 
whose illness, perhaps, you have heard; and I came be¬ 
cause I am so accustomed to seeing my father about 
that the house does not look the same without him.” 

This audacious statement, as the reader will have 
divined, was not exactly true; but it came from 
George’s lips less as a deliberate falsehood than be- < 
cause he thought it well to explain his presence, and 
found himself, before he knew it, involved in a state¬ 
ment of which he did not exactly see the way out. 


PUTTING THE MACHINERY IN MOTION. 


26l 


At the same time it was true that Dr. Billington’s 
prolonged absence from home took away from it 
something more than his presence—deprived it of a 
certain atmosphere of masterdom and responsibility, 
which George felt, without consciously admitting it. 

“ I should like,” he continued, wondering at his 
Own volubility, “ to be in some profession, but it is 
now too late. That ought to have been attended to 
years ago.” 

“ I have sometimes thought,” said Beatrice, gently, 
“ whether there might not occasionally be for a man, 
not less than a woman, a vocation which should con¬ 
sist in just living, being, cultivating one’s self, and 
doing;—doing, I mean, all the good that one finds to 
do without devoting so many hours a day to any 
regular business or profession. There is an art and 
science of life, you know,” she added, smiling, “ which 
are, to the ignorance with which most persons set to 
work at it, what professional skill is, in any art, con¬ 
trasted with the mistakes and blunders of the mere 
dabbler.” 

“ That is the kind of life I should like to lead,” ex¬ 
claimed George, with something like enthusiasm in 
his eyes. “ A life in which everything was well- 
ordered, and every day was filled with something 
worth doing, not because you were paid for it, not 
because it was your duty or profession, but because 
you liked to do it, because it came to you to do, and 
because it fitted in with your own notions of what 
your life ought to be.” 

Beatrice glanced at him. She had only met him 
before in crowded and heated reception-rooms, where 
nothing can be exchanged but the merest mince-meat 


262 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


of conversation, the veriest cat’s-cradle of small-talk, 
where the slender thread of thought is incessantly 
going through a feeble round of frivolous changes. 

“ I am afraid very few of us are fitted for that kind 
of life,” she answered. 

“ Fewer men than women,” responded George, with 
an intention of saying something gallant. He was 
not entirely successful, for he added, “ Men must bear 
the burden and heat of the day. You expect endur¬ 
ance in men.” 

“ And find it in women.” 

This time they glanced at each other. Beatrice 
wore an arch smile. No one could have detected be¬ 
neath it the sorrow that, when she was alone, kept 
her silent and grave, or, when she closed her eyes for 
nightly rest, made her wonder what could happen to 
give her life anything approaching the interest it had 
lost. She was smiling good-humoredly at her own 
reply, which had fallen upon George with the refresh¬ 
ing but somewhat startling effect of an unexpected 
douche. 

“ I think you are entirely right,” he answered. 
“We are all the time finding in your sex the virtues 
we ought to know were there if we only took the 
trouble to observe.” 

As he looked at Beatrice there was something in 
the quiet earnestness of her character that struck him 
with a force equal to that which her mere beauty 
alone had exerted. The potency of her spirit touched 
him as it had never touched him before, and he real¬ 
ized dimly that beyond the grace and charm of her 
aspect dwelt an influence that rendered her, if not 
inaccessible, not easily approachable. This conviction 


PUTTING THE MACHINERY IN MOl ION. 263 

dulled his tongue a little, and it was fortunate, in his 
estimation, that the rest of the conversation was saved 
from languishing by the fact that they had now 
reached the porch of the hotel where Mrs. Orme and 
Beatrice were staying. 

Mr. Van Stein’s illness did not necessarily detain 
Dr. Billington at Richfield Springs for more than 
twenty-four hours; but as he thought more of his son’s 
happiness than he did of that of all the patients who 
had ever applied to him, and certainly more than that 
of all who were at that moment impatiently waiting in 
New York to see him, he delayed his return as long 
as possible. At first he used the pretext of the mil- 
lionnaire’s apoplexy as long as it could decently be 
used, and until it became quite certain that he would 
recover. Then he pretended—and with entire success, 
for he was a perfect adept in that sort of duplicity 
—that he himself needed change of air and the ren¬ 
ovating waters of the springs. He was heard pub¬ 
licly to assert that the sanitary condition of the world 
would be improved if not a drug were ever used for 
medicinal purposes, and that the pure air, pure water, 
a simple life, agreeable work, and moderate exercise 
were better than all the pills and potions in the phar¬ 
macopoeia. This opinion, proceeding from so eminent 
an authority, was bruited around as though it were a 
novel assertion worthy of the Delphian oracle, and 
passed from mouth to mouth with the flash of an epi¬ 
gram in the salon of a Madame Recamier. That is 
one of the privileges of being a great doctor—or 
rather a doctor with a great reputation. You can 


264 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


utter truisms as though they were profundities, and 
have your commonplaces greeted with the prestige of 
witticisms. 

Accordingly, the good old doctor sat on the porch 
of his hotel every morning, or walked in the grounds 
where he had encountered Mrs. Orme and Beatrice, 
and privately told his son that his patients might go 
to the devil. He wrote home to his housekeeper to 
see that patients who called were told that he would 
be absent for a fortnight. Whatever private vexation* 
he might have felt, he stifled for the sake of his dar¬ 
ling son, and acted the part of Mephistopheles to the 
Martha of Mrs. Orme, that the really youthful Faust 
might prosper in his first besiegement of so enchant¬ 
ing a Marguerita. We have mentioned that Mrs. 
Orme was fond of society and the church. There 
was another topic upon which she was never tired of 
descanting when she could find an attentive listener, 
and that was the maladies that afflict mortal flesh—es¬ 
pecially those which afflicted her own. Perceiving this 
weakness, the doctor gave her all the encouragement 
she could possibly have demanded. Better still, he 
told her to drink a pint of boiling water three times a 
day, an hour before meals, and he bestowed upon her 
several valuable prescriptions to charm away wake¬ 
fulness, and restore the paradise of tranquillity to 
nerves racked with pandemonium. By these means 
he managed to monopolize a great deal of the mother’s 
society, in order that the daughter’s might be con¬ 
ferred upon the son. By indirect insinuations he made 
it apparent that the idolatry he lavished upon George 
was fully returned, and that father and son lived only 
for each other. 


PUTTING THE MACHINERY IN MOTION. 265 

“ But some day he will marry,” exclaimed Mrs. 
Orme. 

“ No—no,” answered the old man, purposely throw¬ 
ing into his voice that shade of negative which im¬ 
plies a secret under current of affirmation, “ I am 
afraid not—I had nearly said I hope not. He is so 
fastidious, he is so very difficult to suit. But if he 
should find some nearly perfect woman,”—here the 
doctor threw an almost languishing gaze into Mrs. 
Orme’s eyes,—“ it is just possible I might be recon¬ 
ciled.” 

Mrs. Orme shared the general disposition of all 
mothers to see their daughters well married. She 
was not a philosopher, and did not argue that in order 
that there should be an end to the miseries in the 
world there should be no marriages and no children. 
She took a woman’s affectionate interest in the pos¬ 
sibility of becoming a grandmother and even a great¬ 
grandmother, and was not at all reconciled to the 
prospect of her daughter’s languishing in unmated 
obscurity. She took for granted that it was one of 
the natural duties of young men and women to be¬ 
come husbands and wives, fathers and mothers; a duty 
they owed society not less than themselves, an ob¬ 
ligation which posterity as well as ancestry made in¬ 
cumbent. Marmaduke had completely answered to 
the visions of a son-in-law in which she had delight¬ 
edly indulged. He was young, handsome, talented, 
ardent, affectionate, religious, without vices, a gentle¬ 
man, and rich. Could any woman have desired more ? 
And even when she discovered that matrimony would 
reduce him to poverty, so winsome and charming 
were all his other qualities, and such confidence did 


2 66 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


she have in his power to raise himself by his talents, 
that she would have rather given Beatrice to his keep¬ 
ing than seen her the wife of a less delightful man 
whose financial future was assured. 

During the months that had elapsed since Marma- 
duke’s departure, she had had plenty of time to think 
over the position, and she was compelled to own that 
there was no one to take his place. The comparative 
solitude of her life enabled her to present her daugh¬ 
ter in little of that advantageous light in which am¬ 
bitious mothers are fond of exhibiting their wares ; 
and she keenly suspected that the spell of Marma- 
duke’s memory was far too potent soon to die away. 
At Richfield Springs she had found noneof herown old 
friends belonging to that exclusive and aristocratic 
circle before whose portals she bowed, in spirit, almost 
as reverently as before the altar of St. Remigius. She 
was only slightly acquainted with several very rich 
and, truth to tell, somewhat purse-proud families who 
were resting there for a few weeks, and who showed 
little disposition to exchange any but the most dis¬ 
tant civilities. She was on little better terms with 
the vulgar Van Steins, whose wealth did as much for 
them as wealth alone is capable of doing, and for 
whom Mrs. Orme felt that unmeasured scorn—a scorn 
that almost despises the trouble of expressing itself— 
which the born patrician feels for the plebeian become 
parvenu. A self-made man was without estimation 
in her eyes when he was merely a man of gold. On 
the other hand, the veriest ninny became interesting 
if he belonged to a good family. She knew a dozen 
boobies to whom fate had been thus paitial. Like 


PUTTING THE MACHINERY IN MOTION. 


267 


mathematical points, they had no dimensions but 
merely position—and this position excited her respect. 

In the young man whom Dr. Billington had now 
thrown in her way, without appearing to do so, she 
found one who was equally removed from the boobies 
of august family on the one side, and from Marma- 
dulce on the other. George was far from being a 
booby. He had the manner and appearance of a 
gentleman, and knew perfectly well how to be pleas¬ 
ant, if not absolutely fascinating. He was without 
the personal charm which had been so strong a point 
in Marmaduke’s favor, but he had a certain suggest¬ 
iveness of reckless dash that found approval in the 
eyes of Mrs. Orme. He did not salute her with that 
grave urbanity and deferential sweetness which she 
had found so irresistible in the other young man ; 
but he behaved as courtesy required, and was open 
to no criticism in that direction. He was not “highly 
connected,”—an amusing phraseology, which has been 
too largely borrowed from a certain class of our Eng¬ 
lish cousins,—but his family was good and his father 
was distinguished. Nor could Mrs. Orme hide from 
herself the fact that though George would not fall 
heir to immense wealth, he would be sufficiently rich to 
become a highly desirable appendage to a mother-in- 
law who had just lost about one half of her worldly 
possessions. 

Having indicated the nearer, but, as yet, very in¬ 
definite relations .which the two sides of the little 
party now held to each other, we must leave them for 
awhile for those relations to flourish or fall to the 
ground, as the proximate and remote results of mo¬ 
tives passing into action shall determine. We may 


268 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


pause to assert, however, that Beatrice was the only 
member who, as the weeks passed by, was ignorant 
of this vague complicity, and that the doctor viewed 
with apparent indifference the money he was losing 
by his prolonged absence from the carved oak chair 
in which he was accustomed to receive his fees. Such 
a vacation he had never been known to take in all his 
professional career. His two weeks expanded into 
two more, and patients, tired of waiting for him in 
New York, began to make a pilgrimage to Richfield 
Springs, where occasional newspaper paragraphs 
stated he was to be found. Neurasthenic strangers 
who found him solemn, stately, and severe, and the 
favored few who unearthed the grim joviality lying 
underneath his worldliness, never suspected that he 
was busy playing the role of match-maker, and that 
the pensive-looking lady with the white hair, with 
whom he was seen every morning in the park, was 
already, in his mind’s-eye, the mother-in-law of the 
stylish young man who was quite as often witnessed 
in the company of her stately and handsome daugh¬ 
ter. 


THE RED FLAG. 


269 


CHAPTER XVI. 

THE RED FLAG. 

To say that Mrs. Mincer was again in trouble would 
be merely to state that one of her old experiences 
was repeating itself with peculiarly disagreeable 
intensity. Mention has been made of a red flag 
which, from time to time, waved, in her imagination, 
in front of the house she occupied, and invited all 
who listed to come and buy. She had been haunted 
periodically by this apparition for a good many 
years, but just as it seemed about to become an ob¬ 
jective fact, something had always happened to post¬ 
pone the fatal moment, and the household affairs ran 
with comparative smoothness until the end of the 
season. We have seen how, when one of these lam¬ 
entable crises seemed approaching, she was helped 
in the most unexpected manner in a quarter upon 
which she was entirely unaccustomed to rely. The 
impracticable Bob had suddenly stepped to the 
front with four hundred dollars of hard cash, with 
which Mrs. Mincer had instantly proceeded to as¬ 
suage various pressing demands. She had assured 
herself that, this being done, and the summer bridged 
over, September, or, at farthest, October, would see 
her all right again, her house full, every room occu¬ 
pied, table-boarders flocking to her with avidity, and 
perhaps a few hundred extra dollars, in the shape 


270 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


of conscience-money, coming from some repentant 
swindler who bad run away in her debt and left 
an array of empty trunks behind. Of all “ darned 
boarders,” Bob was wont to declare these were the 
darndest. 

But this time Mrs. Mincer’s calculations went awry. 
The Ormes did not return at the end of the summer 
season. They were, in fact, lingering on at Richfield 
Springs. The youthful couple who had taken a flat 
on trial, and were obliged to sleep in a dark closet 
six feet square, without light or ventilation, dignified 
by the name of bed-chamber, were, nevertheless, 
so well content that they did not abandon their ex¬ 
periment and return to the snug second-story back 
they had enjoyed with her. The young gentlemen 
who had brightened her two favorite hall bedrooms 
with their presence went further uptown when they 
reached port after tasting the delights of London 
and Paris. The Spanish gentleman who had gone to 
visit his native land had possibly fallen so much in 
love with it as to refuse to forsake it again, for Mrs. 
Mincer saw him no more. The back parlor was very 
seldom rented for more than a few days at a time, 
to any one, and “ transients,” though very well as an 
occasional help, were not worth counting upon. The 
widow Barkwood was, therefore, the sole remaining 
boarder in Mrs. Mincer’s sparkling little establish¬ 
ment. She still lingered on, in the third-story front 
room, and paid her board with a regularity which 
spoke well for the financial prosperity of the Female 
Universal Peace Society. Mrs. Mincer would willingly 
have got rid of Mrs. Barkwood if she could, for the 
latter’s appetite was prodigious, her voice was 


THE RED FLAG. 


271 


sharper than Mrs. Mincer’s could ever hope to be, 
even at the concert pitch of indignation, and she ex¬ 
acted as great a variety in the menu as though the 
table were crowded. Ah ! ladies and gentlemen, 
this is another grief the landlady has which, possibly, 
you have never accurately measured. Whether her 
boarders be many or few, she is expected—and rea¬ 
sonably expected, that’s where the rub is—to furnish 
an excellent variety. She is not permitted to hide 
her poverty behind cheap onions and turnips when 
cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, and Jerusalem arti¬ 
chokes are in the market. If she evinces a monstrous 
fondness for Irish stew in order that the pieces may 
all be utilized, she is reminded that spring chickens 
are in order ; and when she seeks to beguile you 
with boiled mutton and carrots, she is given to un¬ 
derstand that you pay for roast lamb and green 
peas. These were the wholesome truths which the stal¬ 
wart Mrs. Barkwood strove to enforce when she found 
the dishes to which she had been accustomed gradu¬ 
ally dwindling away, until she was almost confined 
to an alternation of mutton-chops and beefsteak at 
breakfast, and hot roast beef and cold roast beef at 
dinner—all that Mrs. Mincer’s ebbing resources per¬ 
mitted her to provide. Though Mrs. Barkwood rep¬ 
resented a Peace Society, her society was ill-calculated 
to promote peace. She was belligerent by nature, 
and by virtue of her combativeness had been chosen 
to collect the debts owed to the association. For 
almost the first time in her life poor Mrs. Mincer 
found herself compelled to put up with the in¬ 
solence of a coarse-minded woman, whom she dared 



272 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


not turn out of the house simply because that would 
mean twelve dollars a week less in her pocket. 

So the little woman advertised and advertised. 
She and Bob, between them, prepared the most cun¬ 
ning and alluring phrases with which to decoy per¬ 
sons looking for board to their cheerful little home. 
Once they even went so far as to advertise “ board in 
a private family,” for they had often observed that 
that sort of inducement is favorably regarded by 
people of a quiet type. “ And if this is not a private 
family,” said Mrs. Mincer, “ Great Scott ! I should 
like to know what it is. A family can scarcely be 
less than two.” In which statement she was undoubt¬ 
edly in the right. 

Nevertheless, the boarders did not come. Plenty 
of men and women called and inspected the apart¬ 
ments, asked the usual number of pertinent and im¬ 
pertinent questions, and then left, saying they would 
let her know. But they never called again. Bob’s 
money was nearly exhausted. He had not accumu¬ 
lated any more, and had no new monetary surprises 
in reserve. The strains from his Stradivarius used 
to sound more melancholy than ever as they echoed 
down the deserted stairs. Things had reached “ a 
pretty pass.” The little woman had dismissed both 
her servants, hired a woman who came several times 
a day and did the rough work, while she herself, with 
deft hands, did the cooking, and attended to most of 
the other duties of the house, Bob being on hand for 
the miscellaneous chores. After dinner, at which a 
grim silence usually prevailed, interrupted merely by 
several ghostly attempts at jocularity on Bob’s part, 
severely frowned down by his wife, this strangely 


THE RED FLAG. 


273 


matched couple might be seen in the kitchen 
together, she washing the dishes, while Bob wiped 
them swiftly and dexterously, and put them in their 
respective places. Mrs. Mincer said, at least a score 
of times, that she never thought things would come 
to such a pass as that : but they had. 

One morning, late in October, she sat all alone in 
the silent house. Mrs. Barkwood had Long since 
gone on her daily business of bill-collecting: servants 
there were none; and even Bob was absent, in the 
hope, equally vain and vague, of getting “ something 
to do.” The little woman had been crying—an un¬ 
accustomed luxury; for ordinarily she looked sternly 
enough in fate’s face to stare it out of countenance, 
had it not been capable of defying Medusa herself. 
But now her eyes were red ; the tears, frequently 
repressed, started again and again, in spite of her ef¬ 
forts, and she could hardly make out the type in the 
newspaper, which she had picked up to see how the 
advertisement looked—the last advertisement, she 
said, she was ever going to insert if it was not favor¬ 
ably answered. Suddenly, as she turned the sheet 
over, she gave it a sudden twitch that fixed a particu¬ 
lar portion of the page before her. She wiped her 
eyes dry in order to see more plainly, and then held 
up the paper as before. At this moment Bob’s key 
was heard in the latch, and in a moment more he 
entered. 

“ What’s the matter, Jennie?” he asked, as he saw 
his wife’s red eyes. 

“ Nothing in particular,” answered Jennie, trying 
to repress an odd twinkle, that was struggling for 
expression. “ A little down in the mouth.” 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


274 

“ There’s no use being down in the mouth,” re¬ 
turned Bob with an air of philosophy. “ That won’t 
make things any better.” 

If there was anything that made Mrs. Mincer angry 
it was this cool manner of receiving affliction. She 
did not need to be told—who does?—that tears do 
not decrease trouble. But you might as well remind 
a martyr at the stake that his shrieks will not relieve 
his torture. It is- as natural to weep and groan in 
agony as to laugh and smile in joy, and the shallow 
commonplaces of feeble Bobs do not touch the vital 
question. 

“ It’s no use worrying,” added the aggravating 
Bob, by way of corollary. 

“ If you’d worry a little more and fiddle a little 
less,” retorted his wife, “ the house wouldn’t go to 
ruin as it has gone.” 

Bob couldn’t see this. His Stradivarius afforded 
him a great deal of consolation, and did, at times, 
bring in a little money. The practical utility of 
“ fiddling ” therefore, as his wife called it, had been 
demonstrated, though not quite as overwhelmingly as 
she could have wished. 

“What do you suppose we are going to do ?” con¬ 
tinued Mrs. Mincer, looking at him with the calmness 
of despair. 

This was a poser. Confronted with a question of 
this magnitude, Bob found himself quite unable to 
answer. He looked all around the room and seemed 
to be mentally calculating the contents of the other 
apartments. At last he said: 

“The furniture ought to bring something.” 

“ Something!” repeated his wife, with infinite con-. 


THE RED FLAG. 


275 


tempt. “ When the red flag’s up, you’ll see how 
much it will bring. That bedstead in the back par¬ 
lor cost three hundred dollars, and I’m lucky if I get 
fifty for it. Something!” she again repeated, flinging 
at her husband a look which was a poor compliment 
to his arithmetical powers. “ Why, every fool knows 
that at auction things don’t bring nothing. They go 
for a song.” 

“ I can give them that,” said Bob, standing by the 
mantel with his hands underneath his coat-tails. 

“ Don’t be a fool!” exclaimed Jennie; and then 
added, with stinging emphasis, “ Not if you can help 
it—which I begin to doubt.” 

Bob did not answer, but looked at his wife as if she 
were some curious but harmless animal just escaped 
from the menagerie, or from a dime museum, that 
might be expected to be violent but was not known 
to be vicious. 

“Have you read the papers this morning?” con¬ 
tinued Mrs. Mincer, surveying her husband with much 
the same crafty look with which a caged parrot turns 
up its eye at some human interloper. 

“ Yes, the advertisement’s all right,” alluding to 
their latest advertisement, stating that cheerful and 
sunny rooms, with excellent board, at moderate 
prices, might be had in a small private family; refer¬ 
ences exchanged. 

“ Of course it’s all right. Is there any reason to 
suppose it’s all wrong? I am not referring to the 
advertisement,” continued Mrs. Mincer, with a mix¬ 
ture of wrath and dignity. “ I mean, did you look to 
see whether there was anything to your advantage?” 

Again Bob stared at his wife. In former days she 


27 6 


THE LADV OF CAWNPORE. 


was his most relentless ridiculer when he read aloud 
those enticing paragraphs, inserted by solicitors re¬ 
siding in London or Liverpool, and dealing in con¬ 
voluted legal phrases in which the substantives and 
the verbs seemed to shoot wide of each other, and to 
bound along different tangents. Why, therefore, * 
should she take a sudden interest in those advertise¬ 
ments which had persistently turned out to the ad¬ 
vantage of some person with whom he was in no wise 
connected, of whom he had never heard ? 

“ Well, yes,” said Bob, hesitatingly. “ I looked.” 

“ See anything ?” 

“No.” 

“ Look under ‘ Personals ’ ?” 

“ No.” 

“Of course not!” with a flash of scorn. “You 
never do look in the right place for anything. If you 
had looked in the right place, you might have seen 
that." 

And handing him the newspaper she had been con¬ 
sulting, she pointed out, with stiffened finger, the 
paragraph that had attracted her eye just as his key 
entered the latch. It was the last one under the 
column headed “ Personal.” 

“ Read it aloud,” said Jennie, in her imperative 
manner; and Bob, always obedient, read as follows: 

“ If Virginia Creery, who resided in Walnut Street 
above ioth, in the city of Philadelphia, in the year 1857, 
and who subsequently went to the city of New York, 
will call upon Mr. Gurowski, No. 7 Bowling Green, 
she will hear of something to her advantage.” 

Mr. Mincer’s eyes remained fastened devouringly 
upon this paragraph, and Mrs. Mincer’s remained 


THE RED FLAG. 


277 


fastened devouringly upon him. Here was some¬ 
thing that he had looked for anxiously in the news¬ 
papers for years, to pass it over at last, and have it 
pointed out to him by his wife ! 

“ It’s come at last,” he said, looking at her with 
kindling eyes. 

“ What’s come at last ?” 

“Why, the fortune.” 

“Mincer, you are a fool, and no mistake,” she re¬ 
plied, getting up from the sofa and walking about 
the room in that nervous excitement which her hus¬ 
band’s tendency to cling to chimeras always begot. 

“ It doesn’t follow,” she continued, with that sharp 
practicality that characterized her, “ that because my 
maiden name was Virginia Creery and I lived in 
Walnut Street, Philadelphia, I was the only person 
of that name there. There may have been two in the 
same house for what we know.” 

“ But it looks—” began Bob, feebly. 

“Looks! Oh, bother! ” exclaimed Mrs. Mincer, 
snatching the paper out of his hand in the spirit of 
contrariety. “ Some relation I never heard of may 
have died and left me fifty dollars. Some darned 
boarder who ran away without paying may feel like 
sending me the back board. Lucky if I get that J" 

She was belying the hope that was secretly tugging 
at her own heart. Suppose Bob’s golden dream ac¬ 
tually should be realized ! Suppose some uncle in 
the East Indies—not that she ever had an uncle in 
the East Indies, but she had read of such things— 
had suddenly died and left her a million dollars ! 
Stranger things than that had happened ! Then, 
good-bye to the boarding-house. Good-bye to the 



278 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


darned boarders. Good-bye to debts and doubts. 
Good-bye to the insolence of rich and poor alike, 
which differed in quality more than quantity. As 
these thoughts darted through her mind, she ran 
out of the parlor and made hasty steps for her own 
room. 

“Where are you going?” said Bob, calling after 
her. 

“ To put on my bonnet. I’m going to see Mr. 
Gqrowski, of Bowling Green.” 

“ All right. I’ll go with you.” 

In a few moments she was ready, looking almost 
as radiant and youthful as though twenty years had 
been lifted from her brow. Her bad temper had left 
her, and as they rode down town in a Broadway car 
she chatted gaily about the kind of house she would 
have in Fifth Avenue and the style of equipage she 
would drive in the Park if the East Indian uncle had 
really behaved handsomely. 

“ But w'hat is the very first thing you will do with 
your money, Jennie ?” asked Bob, beamingly, sunny 
in the contagion of her own high spirits. 

“ Take your gold watch out of pawn, old man,” 
<$aid Jennie, giving him a sharp but affectionate 
glance. 

Bob turned slightly red. His gold watch—one of 
the few relics of palmier days—was in pawn, but he 
thought he had effectually concealed the fact from 
Jennie, inasmuch as the chain thereof was ostenta¬ 
tiously dangling from his button-hole. 


THE VENGEANCE OF THE BRAHMINS. 


279 


CHAPTER XVII. 

THE REVENGE OF THE BRAHMINS. 

At the very moment that Adw6 was speaking, 
Marmaduke heard, as if from every quarter of the 
apartment, those slight but hideous sounds which 
the cobra makes, but which he had only occasionally 
heard when watching the fantastic performance of 
some professional snake-charmer. The sounds were 
at once hissing and guttural, alternating with a 
frightful burlesque on the clucking which a chicken 
makes when pouncing upon an insect. What Adwe 
had said seemed to be only too true—that the sacks 
thrown in must contain a large number of these 
deadly reptiles ; and, from the more than ordinary 
noise they were making, it was likewise probable 
that they had been kept fasting in order to sharpen 
their fury. He knew quite well that the only safety 
was in remaining perfectly still, and he laid a strong, 
detaining touch upon Adw6, who had sprung to her 
feet. 

“ Where are you going?” he cried. 

“ To call the servants,” she answered. “ They will 
go for a charmer-—-” 

“And you?” cried Marmaduke, interrupting her, 
and holding her with such violence that she could 
not budge. “ Do you not know that you cannot 


a8o 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


cross the room without being bitten, and that if you 
are bitten, death is sure ?” 

“ But I shall save you. What does it matter about 
me ?” And again she tried to escape. 

“ Adwe,” he exclaimed, redoubling the violence 
of his hold upon her, “ you shall not leave me ! You 
shall not risk your liffe for mine. If you go I will 
follow. I will not permit such a sacrifice. I beg 
you—I command you ! Adw£, I love you !” 

She said no more, but resumed her place by his 
side, feeling that moment, as she nestled close 
against him, a profounder peace and happiness than 
had ever visited her troubled bosom in all her little 
life before. But as she clung to him in mute resolu¬ 
tion and courageous quiet, he suddenly felt upon 
the arm he had thrown around her a palsying touch, 
as though an icicle endowed with life and motion 
were beginning to traverse him. This icicle crept 
slowly over him with glutinous feet, and paused 
above his heart, as though delayed there by its warm, 
wild beating. This cold and viscid pathway had 
scarcely been laid across his body than he felt Adwe 
shudder from head to foot, and knew that the ser¬ 
pent was gliding across the delicious velvet of her 
throat. His blood itself seemed to lose its very na¬ 
ture, and to flow stagnantly in chilly rivulets beneath 
the sickening horror of that sensation ; but ere he 
could nerve himself to stoical endurance, another 
icicle attacked his arm, and then a third and fourth, 
until he foresaw that he and Adw£ were doomed to 
lie thus till morning, while the vast and venomous 
procession wound across them, from limb to limb, 
from breast to breast, from heart to heart, leaving a 


THE REVENGE OF THE BRAHMINS. 


28l 


ghastly track upon the tender flesh which had known 
no harsher touch than crystal ablution and balmy 
perfume. No torture conceived by Dante or experi¬ 
enced by Tantalus exceeded the anguish which now 
began. Here was a foe that could not be combated, 
but had to be endured—a foe that was deliberate, 
pitiless, and multiple. Neither of them dared to 
move a joint or utter a sound. They could give to 
one another neither consolation nor encouragement. 
Locked together in an embrace sweeter than life, 
they tasted all the bitterness of death, not once or 
twice, but scores of times, as now singly, now in 
pairs, now, it seemed, in groups, the writhing rep¬ 
tiles, with vermiform motion, crept from form to 
form, never ceasing their guttural sibilancy. Marma- 
duke almost expected that if he lived until the dawn 
he should find a corpse beside him ; for even now he 
imagined that the lips so near his own had lost their 
warmth and redness, just as the heart whose throb¬ 
bing had kept his company had subsided into fright¬ 
ened silence, and scarcely sent a pulsation through 
the clammy skin. A new Laocoon, he endured a 
terror as frightful as that of the father imprisoned 
with his sons in the python’s monstrous coil, with 
this difference—that Marmaduke dare not utter one 
cry to relieve the more than mortal strain. The 
maddening sense of utter impotency in thus being 
compelled to submit, without resistance, to one of 
the most hideous rulings of nature, exaggerated the 
moments far beyond their natural duration, and 
drew the hours out into a length comparable only to 
that induced by the illusions of hasheesh. As there 
is an instrument which can so increase the sound 


282 


THE LADY OF CAVVNPORE. 


made by a fly in walking that it becomes distinctly 
audible, so the tension of terror and expectancy in 
these two statuesque figures made the air appear to 
teem with the low cries and sibilant gasps of the ser¬ 
pents as they continued their reeking passage. 

A day and a night seemed to have passed when 
suddenly a red beam pierced the gray light which 
had begun to penetrate the apartment, and pro¬ 
claimed the first approach of day. Marmaduke, as he 
lay in a state which more resembled catalepsy than 
the natural condition of a human being in repose, 
had marvelled what the means of extrication would 
be. So far as he could see, he and Adwe would have 
to remain there until they were sought by the serv¬ 
ants ; but what could servants avail, except to seek a 
snake-charmer who could lure the cobras to some, 
place where they could be destroyed ?—and how many 
hours might not elapse ere this sort of relief could be 
procured ? At the same time, he could not conceive 
of any other. But the idea of enduring a prolonga¬ 
tion or a repetition of the torture was insupportable. 
Adwe lay as if dead, save for a shudder that occa¬ 
sionally passed over her stiffened body and slightly 
convulsed it. As he gazed at her, and through the 
rapidly increasing light watched one of the snakes, 
with its curious spectacled hood, slowly tracing its 
pestilent course along her gleaming shoulder, an 
almost irresistible desire seized him to make some 
motion that would rouse the ire of the reptile and 
put a speedy end to his life and hers. As this 
temptation danced in his brain with tantalizing vi¬ 
vacity, an unexpected sound smote upon his ear. It 
was a high musical note, and came from the adjoin- 


THE REVENGE OF THE BRAHMINS. 283 

ing garden. The sound was the beginning of a tune 
full of fantastic falls and catches, that appeared to 
proceed from a flageolet, and was of a rhythm heard 
only in India. It sounded more like an invocation to 
the rising sun than anything else ; but he had not 
time to give this consideration weight, for his whole 
attention was now occupied by a remarkable phe¬ 
nomenon. No sooner had the first notes lost them¬ 
selves in the intricacies of this wild and weird ca¬ 
dence, than from every portion of the apartment to 
which they had wandered the reptiles reared their 
heads, some more curiously and inquiringly than 
others, and then, as if with one accord, began a slow 
exodus toward the porch that descended to the 
grounds. The clucking and hissing ceased, and each 
of the reptiles seemed intent only upon outdoing its 
fellows in this rapid and rapt departure The one 
that Marmaduke had observed upon Adwe’s shoulder 
turned, and traversing rapidly the entire length of her 
body, which had now ceased to shudder, clasped Mar- 
maduke’s ankle for an instant as with a clammy 
bracelet, and, falling upon the floor, joined its breth¬ 
ren. The quaint melody of the unseen and mysteri¬ 
ous snake-charmer—for such the musician seemed to 
be—still continued, and the warm, rosy, delicious sun¬ 
light, welcome to Marmaduke as the sight of heaven 
opening to eyes glazed in death, lit up the luxurious 
room and clothed it with joyous radiance. Not a 
cobra w r as to be seen. The music grew more remote, 
and Marmaduke, rising gently, approached the porch 
and saw the venomous horde twisting and writhing 
along the garden walks toward the brink of the 
Ganges ; in the direction of the invisible player. 
There was no interruption to the now plaintive, now 


284 THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 

audacious air, in which the deviltry of life was ex¬ 
pressed along with its unceasing pathos : and who¬ 
ever produced those notes certainly exercised a most 
skilful technique. Finally, as the strain resounded 

* faintly as the horns of Elfland, Marmaduke, giving 
one glance around the apartment, to make sure that 
not a cobra remained, returned to Adwe. She had 
not stirred. He touched her gently. Her skin was 
cold. A sudden terror possessed him—a terror as 
great of its kind as when a sheet of lightning makes 
the earth seem all afire, and the instantaneous 
thunder peals like a shout from stars in pain. Was 
she dead ? The cold clutch around his heart told 
him how dear she had become to him, how ex¬ 
quisitely this tender little being had entwined her 
heartstrings amid his own, so that if one broke the 
other must break too. 

“ Adwe ! Adw6 !” 

He bent over her, taking her chin sweetly between 
his hands, calling her fond names, and unveiling her 
eyes with daintiest touch. Slowly she responded, 
and fixing softly upon him those gentle orbs, in 
whose dark depths violets floated, lay gazing at him 
in a sort of rapture of adoration. 

“ Adw6! Adwe!” he again exclaimed, almost 
frightened at such abstracted ecstasy, “speak to me ! 
We are safe !” 

“Ah, you live !” she murmured in tones of rejoicing 

* triumph, and tried to clasp her little hands around 
his neck. But with that utterance endurance had 
reached its last point, and she fell back in a deep 
faint ere he could clasp her to his heart in passion¬ 
ate response, as the music of the snake-charmer 
ceased. 


“is it true ?" 


285 


CHAPTER XVIIL 

“ IS IT TRUE ?” 

After Adw6, aided by his efforts, had recovered 
consciousness, an indignation to which there were no 
limits sprang up in the heart of Marmaduke. He 
made two resolves : one was to see what the law 
would do toward discovering and punishing the per¬ 
petrator of this cowardly crime ; the other was to 
leave the country, taking Ad we with him so as to place 
her beyond reach of the vengeance which he had little 
reason to suppose would ever slacken its pursuit. 
His first care, however, was to visit the garden; for 
he was anxious to know what had become of the rep¬ 
tiles and who the mysterious deliverer could be. 

With many reassurances to Adwe, who was in a 
state of nervous excitement bordering upon hysteria, 
he left her alone, and, descending to the garden, 
threaded the winding paths that led to the river. As 
he was walking along the brink, peering cautiously 
hither and thither, his eyes fell upon a strange sight. 
For the last few months he had been so absorbed in 
Adwe that he had entirely forgotten Dalpatram, the 
fakir. This remarkable person, instead of returning 
to Tranquebar after having completed the mentrams 
(or prayers) incidental to the obsequies which had 
brought him to Benares, had continued to occupy the 
little cottage which Marmaduke had bestowed upon 


286 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


him. There he had remained undisturbed, engaged, 
sometimes for days at a stretch, in those mystic con¬ 
templations which are the habit of various classes of 
orientals who devote themselves to occult studies. 
Occasionally he had visited Marmaduke’s apartment, 
upon invitation, and had given exhibitions of his 
power as strange as those which had attended his 
first interview with the young man. But he had evi¬ 
dently never entirely forgiven the imperative look 
and attitude, the blazing eyes and fiery gesture with 
which Marmaduke had dismissed him, at the conclu¬ 
sion of that interview. Marmaduke had endeavored 
to make all the atonement possible, for he recognized 
that, if either had been in the wrong, it was he and 
not Dalpatram, since the latter had only exerted his 
marvellous ability in response to an invitation, and 
was not to blame if the result had aroused a potent 
and poignant emotion in the spectator. Since then 
the behavior of Dalpatram had been respectful but 
not cordial. But he was evidently well content to 
remain Marmaduke’s guest—if so he could be called 
—for an indefinite time. His wants were few; his 
habits were simple; he did as he pleased, and his 
solitary life in the cottage allowed him all the leisure 
he wished. 

As we have said, Marmaduke had lately almost for¬ 
gotten his existence; but now the singularity of the 
sight that unfolded itself stimulated at once his 
curiosity and suspicion. Upon the edge of the river, 
in that corner of the garden where the cottage stood, 
rested a large square box, over which the fakir was 
that moment engaged in fitting a lid. As Marma¬ 
duke stepped hastily and almost noiselessly forward, 


IS IT TRUE?” 


287 


the fakir turned round with a start, that was at once 
controlled. His face was livid, and the torpor in his 
large eyes was lit by two points of fire like sparks 
kindled in the core of two ovals of green flint. His 
body was interposed between Marmaduke and the 
box, but this did not prevent the young man from 
seeing, as he pressed forward, that the receptacle 
contained two large stones, meant for sinking it when 
it should be cast into the river, and that it held in 
one writhing and hissing mass the cobras which had 
recently been lured from his apartment at the call 
of the flageolet, that now lay upon the ground at a 
distance. 

A black suspicion changed the expression of Mar- 
maduke’s face to rage. Had Dalpatram been in 
league with the Brahmins? Was it not he who had 
thrown the cobras in the first place ?—and then, sup¬ 
posing that they had accomplished the deadly mis¬ 
sion on which they were sent, was it not he who had 
lured them forth in order to conceal the evidences of 
the crime ? 

“ What are you doing ?” exclaimed Marmaduke, 
pointing to the box, and addressing Dalpatram in 
Hindoostanee. 

“ I am going to drown them, Sahib,” answered the 
fakir, adjusting the lid, which now needed only a 
couple of nails to make it secure. 

“ And the cobras—where do you suppose they came 
from ?” 

“ I do not know. As I played the music, sitting 
by the river’s brink, suddenly they began to appear, 
as if from the upper part of the garden. They must 
have been concealed there ; for never such a number, 


288 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


in one spot, have I seen before—and the Sahib should 
set apart this day in order to give thanks to the gods 
that, often as he walks in the garden, he has never 
once been bitten. Seeing that they came to my music 
and knowing that more would come if more there 
were, I pulled out this box, which I found lying about 
the grounds, and they willingly went into it as I con¬ 
tinued to play. The Sahib knows the rest. And 
now, with the Sahib’s permission, I will finish the 
work.” 

So saying, Dalpatram proceeded to drive a few nails 
into the box. Marmaduke stood musing. It appeared 
to him impossible that the fakir could suppose that 
the garden had held so many concealed cobras. Such 
a thing was inconceivable. The young man could 
not doubt that they had been thrown in at the win¬ 
dow, as Adwe had testified ; besides, the two bags 
which had contained them were still lying on the 
floor of the room. The window through which they 
had been flung, however, had no connection with the 
garden, but opened upon the street. If thrown by 
Dalpatram, therefore, the latter must have escaped, 
under cover of the shadows, into the garden by means 
of the small postern by which Marmaduke had first 
given admission to Adwe. He stood debating these 
things, and lost in reverie, when he was suddenly 
aroused by the plunge of some large body into the 
waves of the river, and looking up saw the eddying 
circles made by the box, which, weighted with the 
heavy stones, had just been capsized by the fakir. 

“ How is it you happened to play your flageolet on 
this particular morning?” asked Marmaduke, looking 
at Dalpatram with a menacing intensity, which for 


“is it true?” 


289 


the moment almost equalled in open hatred the veiled 
malevolence of the fakir’s eyes. Dalpatram looked 
at him with ever so little of a shrug—that universal 
speech which gives to the shoulders an eloquence 
denied to the tongue. 

“ I have frequently played on other mornings, but 
possibly the Sahib has been overpowered by slumber 
and has not heard.” 

Marmaduke could not deny that this might be so. 
He usually woke and rose early, like most of the in¬ 
habitants, the comparative coolness of the morning 
hours being wisely utilized, and the mid-day siesta 
compensating for the sleep thus lost. But it might 
well be that the fakir was a still earlier riser, and it 
was quite possible that he might have played upon 
his flageolet more than once before without being 
overheard. Nevertheless, as Marmaduke weighed all 
these peradventures, his ire became more intense. 
He turned to the fakir and said: 

“It is fortunate for me that Dalpatram-Omi, son 
of Naranjara-Omi, includes snake-charming among 
his many accomplishments.” 

Dalpatram bowed very low, his hands raised to his 
forehead, and answered: 

“ Will the Sahib explain ?” 

Marmaduke related briefly all that had occurred, 
keeping his eyes fixed intently upon the fakir, whose 
countenance never altered and whose gaze never 
flinched. But in those orbs which Marmaduke stood 
watching there slowly gathered a quiet fury, a con¬ 
centrated darkness, like that which imperceptibly 
pervades the thunder-cloud until it dashes its invec¬ 
tive against the helpless earth. As he concluded, 


290 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


Marmaduke turned from this ghastly presence, which 
had now grown monstrous in its tranquillity, and felt 
a sickness of the flesh which was probably the re¬ 
action from all he had been through. He tottered. 
The fakir put forth a supporting arm. 

“ Do not touch me !” exclaimed the young man, 
mastering the weakness and evading the fakir with 
a look of horror and contempt. “ Leave this place 
instantly ! You have been here too long. With your 
mentrams and incantations you bring a curse upon 
every place you haunt. If I discover that you have 
the slightest complicity with this affair, your religion 
shall not save you, nor the law. The law ? I will 
take the law into my own hands. Your life shall an¬ 
swer me. And I shall be glad to have helped you to 
begin a series of a thousand hideous re-incarnations. 
Begone !” 

And with commanding gesture he pointed to the 
postern, which was but a little distance away. Again 
the fakir bowed almost to the ground, touching his 
hands to his head. 

“ May the immortal powers watch over you and 
protect your days !” 

They were the first words which Dalpatram-Omi, 
son of Naranjara-Omi, had uttered upon coming into 
Marmaduke’s presence. They were the last, as, pick¬ 
ing up the flageolet, the fakir went out by the post¬ 
ern, never once looking back. 

Marmaduke returned to the house, feeling his own 
impotency in dealing with oriental methods of re¬ 
venge. There were only two things he could do, and 
neither promised any material return. He could call 
again upon the English judge whom he had formerly 


IS IT TRUE ?” 


29I 


seen, and he could visit the pagoda occupied by the 
priests from whom Ad we had escaped. He took both 
of these courses. His interview with the judge was 
neither less nor more satisfactory than the first had 
been. The old gentleman listened to him with deep 
attention, and introduced him to his secretary, a 
young man several years the junior of Marmaduke, 
an Eurasian, who regarded him wrth an interest for 
which the American could not account, and who, at 
the conclusion of the story, said, in perfectly accented 
English : 

“ There is only one thing in which absolute safety 
lies, Mr. Allan.” 

“ And what is that ?” 

“ It consists in leaving the country as soon as pos¬ 
sible, and in taking the girl with you.” 

Marmaduke looked from the Eurasian to the judge. 
The latter bowed his head gravely, and said : 

“ Apprize the chief of police, and he will employ 
detectives. He will do everything that can be done ; 
but I warn you, beforehand, that you must expect 
nothing. These Brahmin priests are very cunning. 
They will have left no clue that is discoverable. 
Take our advice, Mr. Allan, and leave the country as 
soon as possible.” 

Marmaduke thanked him and departed; and as he 
did so he again perceived the Eurasian directing upon 
him a glance of peculiar interest and curiosity, the 
import of which he could not fathom. 

Making his way through the crowds who were 
scattering flowers in the sacred wells with which 
Benares is perforated, and strewing offerings of 
every description into the stone boxes at the entrances 



292 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


of the temples, Marmaduke arrived at the pagoda of 
which he was in quest, and after waiting a long time 
saw several of the priests whom he suspected of the 
murderous outrage of the previous night. They 
listened to him with every appearance of amazement 
and horror, and were loud in their denunciation of 
the perpetrators, whoever they might be. They in¬ 
voked the wrath of Siva upon them, and told Marma¬ 
duke they would make special petitions to that deity, 
in order that he and his might be under peculiar pro¬ 
tection. 

All these fair words and smooth promises availed 
nothing with the now thoroughly excited young 
man. He knew enough of the character of those 
to whom he was speaking to be aware that they held 
personal violence in dread much more than the 
vague and remote terrors of the law. He knew that 
they could be held in restraint more by this bodily 
fear than by any other appeal, and therefore, in 
parting from them, he turned and said: 

“ When I discover the perpetrators, I shall not wait 
for the law. I would willingly lose my own life in 
taking theirs, rather than that they should escape.” 

He thought he detected how, beneath their impas¬ 
sivity, two or three of the priests shrank at these 
words. But he was too worn out with all that he had 
endured for the last twelve hours, to tarry longer. 
Besides, he was tortured with anxiety to get back to 
Adwe and assure himself of her continued safety. 
He had not encountered Dalpatram, and had no 
means of ascertaining whether he was in communica¬ 
tion with the Brahmins of the pagoda, or whether he 
had immediately set out for his native Tranquebar. 


IS IT TRUE ?” 


293 


As Marmaduke gently opened the door of the 
zenana, he heard Adwe’s soft voice singing, to the 
simplest accompaniment the piano afforded: 

“ One sweetly solemn thought 
Comes to me o’er and o’er,— 

That I’m nearer my home to-day 
Than I’ve ever been before.’* 

He paused and listened. Adwe had evidently 
been perfecting herself in the words and tune of this 
hymn, and in the art of accompanying herself, from 
time to time when he was absent. He had never 
heard her sing it before. Something akin to the 
“ sweetly solemn thought” referred to in the lines 
stole over him as these words, in their gentle and 
plaintive intonation, came to him : 

“ Nearer the bond of life, 

Where we lay our burdens down ; 

Nearer leaving the Cross, 

Nearer gaining the Crown. 

“ Be near me when my feet 

Are slipping over the brink ; 

For I’m nearer home to-day, 

Nearer than now I think.” 

Was it the shadow of the death that had so lately 
hung over her that sent a sudden thrill through his 
heart as he stood watching, her hands resting upon 
the keys, her face upturned, a look of refined and 
exalted sadness upon it that he had never seen there 
before ? At what was she gazing with such an air 
of wistful brooding ? He bent slightly forward. On 


294 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


the wall, above the piano, she had fastened the cru¬ 
cifix which she had discovered some weeks previous. 
One of the many spots of light, making their way 
through curtains and corridors, flecking the walls and 
ceiling, had fallen upon the upper part of this cruci¬ 
fix, and encircled the head as with an extended 
aureole. 

Marmaduke stepped forward. Adwe started to her 
feet and embraced him eagerly. 

“ Of what were you thinking ?” he asked tenderly, 
noticing the abstracted air that still lingered on her 
brow. 

“ I was thinking,” she replied, glancing at the 
crucifix, “ how strange, how very strange it would be 
if it were true.” 

“If what were true?” he questioned, though he 
presaged her reply. 

“ The story of the Cross,” she murmured, gazing 
on him with fondest eyes, in which every other emo¬ 
tion seemed melted into love. “ See,” she continued, 
picking up one of those popular hymn-books used in 
missions, and which somehow had found its way 
into Adwe’s keeping ; and turning over the pages 
with a sureness of search that proved she was familiar 
with them, she quickly found the place and read 
with her pretty accent, the following well-known 
lines: 


“ He left His starry crown. 

And laid His robes aside ; 

On wings of love came down, 

And wept, and bled, and died ; 

What He endured, no tongue can tell. 
To save our souls from death and hell.” 


IS IT TRUE ?” 


2 95 


She paused for a moment. “ Is it true ? is it true ?” 
he heard her softly repeating as if, for an instant, she 
was unconscious of his presence. Then she con¬ 
tinued: 


“ From the dark grave He rose— 

The mansion of the dead ; 

And thence His mighty foes 
In glorious triumph led ; 

Up thro’ the sky the Conqueror rode. 

And reigns on high the Saviour God. 

“From thence He’ll quickly come— 

His chariot will not stay— 

And bear our spirits home 
To realms of endless day ; 

There shall we see His lovely face 
And ever be in His embrace.” 

As Marmaduke listened, even her pretty mispro¬ 
nunciation, instead of distracting his attention, 
served to heighten the pathos of her wistful, inquir¬ 
ing voice ; and when she finished and again stole up 
to him, murmuring with such sad sweetness, “ Is it 
true ?” he could only hide her face gently against his 
heart that his own might not be seen, and utter 
evasive and consoling words. He took the book 
from her and glanced through it. It was one that 
Mr. Loveridge used at his missionary meetings. 
The good old man occasionally came to the palace : 
for though he had been brought up in too stern a 
school to approve of Marmaduke’s mode of life, he 
did not like to lose sight of him, and he had read 
enough of the young man’s character to feel sure 
that no ordinary cause could be at work to have 


296 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


wrought in him so profound a change. How the 
hymn-book had got into Adw6’s apartment Marma- 
duke could not conjecture. Possibly he had brought 
it there among some others, not noting its nature. 
Had his heart stated the matter frankly, it would 
probably have said that his desire was that Adwe 
should not bother herself with religious questions. 
But her discovery of the crucifix had suddenly 
brought the central point of the atonement and 
redemption vividly before her, and it had not been 
possible to avoid returning some answer to the ques¬ 
tions thus started. Such information as he had 
given had provoked an unexpected interest in a 
mind naturally alert and intelligent,and only a short 
time had elapsed before Adwe was as familiar with 
the gospels as her restricted knowledge of English 
would permit. Pie had helped her in this as little as 
possible, but he had not found himself able to con¬ 
scientiously throw any obstacles in her path. It 
never occurred to him that the hope of the Christian 
could take sudden and deep root in a mind which 
seemed totally unprepared to receive it. He had 
had the idea that Paul must plant and Apollos water 
before God could give the increase, and he was 
aware that with regard to Adwe no evangelizing 
effort had been made. The spectacle of a crucified 
Redeemer had been brought before her suddenly by 
the crucifix, in the midst of her pagan ignorance, 
filled as her mind was with all the convictions 
and superstitions incident to the religion in which 
she was born. He had expected that this first im¬ 
pression would speedily wear away. But such had 
not been the case, and in fact it almost seemed as 


IS IT TRUE ?” 


297 

though her gentle nature, the loneliness of her posi¬ 
tion, and the extreme uncertainty of her future, 
peculiarly fitted her to be the recipient of consola¬ 
tions which the Christian religion proffers to those 
who accept it. 

That morning Marmaduke unfolded to Adwe his 
purpose of leaving Hindoostan and taking her with 
him to some place in Europe where they could learn 
what it was to live in absolute security from the 
storms that threatened them there. The entire peace 
in which they had dwelt, up to last evening, had 
lulled him into a deceptive sense of safety, and 
looking back now over the months that had elapsed, 
it almost seemed to him that some unseen hand must 
have been stretched forth to extend a protection that 
he could not otherwise have enjoyed. This was but 
a passing sentiment, however. He was occupied 
with contemplating the future. He would, as soon 
as feasible, purchase a swift-sailing yacht, which 
would receive them at a point as unremote as possi¬ 
ble from the foot of the garden, and bear them from 
that accursed country which, amid the most gor¬ 
geous productions of art and nature, tottered beneath 
its millions of idols, its enervating debaucheries, and 
its sacrifices of blood and fire. He would seek out 
some gentle clime where the sun shone with less 
burning lustre, and the blood leaped less torridly in 
more temperate veins. As he sat and thought, a 
curtain seemed to lift magically upon a landscape of 
eternal spring where he and Adwe were embowered, 
the lurid turmoil of their present existence past and 
over, and sober duties and moderate delights making 


298 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORF.. 


the total of the peaceful days. He gave a long sigh 
of deep relief. 

The gentlest of whispers, soft as a feather from an 
angel’s wing, touched his ear. Adwe, wearied out 
with the terrific strain of the preceding night, had 
fallen asleep upon the divan, her head pillowed on 
his lap. The sound issued from her slightly parted 
lips, and listening intently Marmaduke heard her 
murmur, through the wistful trances of her dream : 

“ Is it true ?” 


THE JOURNEY THAT WAS ARRANGED. 


2 99 


CHAPTER XIX. 

THE JOURNEY THAT WAS ARRANGED. 

Marmaduke was now busy in a double sense. He 
felt it incumbent to keep a more wary eye than ever 
on the affairs of his household, so as to guard against 
every treachery that might threaten Adwe; while at 
the same time it w r as necessary for him to be absent 
more than usual in secret but unremitting efforts to 
purchase a yacht suited to his purpose. That part 
of the world was not often visited by persons owning 
private yachts such as compete in speed with ocean 
steamers and organize a sea-voyage into a palatial 
luxury; and the few rich persons who did go thither 
with such an equipment were not likely to want to 
dispose of it off-hand. Nevertheless Marmaduke 
knew enough of the very wealthy to be aware that 
they are often subject to strange caprices, and there 
was at that time in Benares a man of enormous in¬ 
come—a brother-in-law, in fact, of Mr. Van Stein, 
Dr. Billington’s patient—whose mind was a perfect 
weather-vane in its whims. He was one of those 
spoiled children of fortune who scour the earth to 
gratify imaginary tastes and sick desires, and return 
to their native land ten times more discontented 
than when they set out. He had already had built 
for him two magnificent yachts, which had been 
the admiration of every port they had visited, and he 


300 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


had disposed of them both because he wanted more 
than the earth could give him, and was a victim of 
that inappeasable ennui resulting from having very- 
much more than his share of the good things of this 
life. Him Marmaduke resolved to sound on the sub¬ 
ject of the yacht, for Mr. John Earle Benton—that 
was his name—though enjoying so immense a revenue, 
was always open to a good bargain; and it was just 
possible that, having got rid of two vessels of that 
kind, he was ready to get rid of a third. 

Meanwhile a certain change had come over Adwe 
which Marmaduke would not have deemed possible, 
intimate as his knowledge now was of all the by-ways 
and cross-paths of her loving and gentle spirit. In 
spite of that unusual vivacity and pliability of mind, 
by virtue whereof she successfully addressed herself 
to pursuits for which all her previous education and 
habits would seem to have unfitted her, he had never 
imputed to her, until now, more than that free, care¬ 
less, and somewhat shallow capacity that fails to 
weigh serious matters with the attentiveness their im¬ 
portance demands. But now he saw how greatly he 
had mistaken. A new love, stronger even than that 
which she bore to him—he could not but feel it—was 
dawning in her nature; a love that, when it has once 
taken possession of the soul with all the intensity of 
which it is susceptible, subdues every other to its 
holy flame, and thrills and penetrates every fibre of 
the being. Some of the simple tunes she had found 
in the hymn-book she had mastered sufficiently to 
play and sing. Frequently, as Marmaduke reached 
the door of the zenana, he overheard a strain with 
which he had become familiar in boyhood, or had 


THE JOURNEY THAT WAS ARRANGED. 


301 


heard at various mission services in which, from time 
to time, he had taken part. One of Adwe’s favorite 
hymns was: 


“ Tell me the old, old story 
Of unseen things above. 
Of Jesus and His glory, 

Of Jesus and His love ; 
Tell me the story simply, 
As to a little child. 

For I am weak and weary, 
And helpless and defiled.” 


But she had other favorites of greater intellectual 
vigor and artistic finish, and one of these was: 

“ When I survey the wondrous cross 
On which the Prince of glory died;” 

and Marmaduke, overhearing her, had often wondered 
at the rapturous expression she threw into the last 
lines: 


“ Were the whole realm of nature mine. 

That were an offering far too small; 

Love so amazing, so divine, 

Demands my soul, my life, myall.” 

Other favorites were “ Behold a stranger at the 
door;” “ Lord, with glowing heart I’d praise Thee 
“ Lead, kindly light “ O Paradise “ I heard 
the voice of Jesus say “ Rock of Ages and espe¬ 
cially “ Jesus, lover of my soul.” It filled Marma¬ 
duke with a vague discontent to hear these hymns 
issuing from that part of the house to which, until 
lately, a spiritual atmosphere had been lacking, 


3°2 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


though all the refinements of affection had been 
there. And one day, when her eyes had been bent 
for a long time over her sewing—an accomplishment 
she had learned from one of her seamstresses—and, 
observing that the needle remained unplied, he asked 
her what she was thinking of, she answered in Eng¬ 
lish, pausing a moment to pre-arrange the words in 
flawless order : 

“ ’Tis religion that will give 
Sweetest pleasure while we live; 

’Tis religion will supply 
Solid comfort when we die.” 

She paused a moment and then continued, in a still 
softer voice, and with downcast eyes: 

“ After death its joys shall be 
Lasting as eternity. 

Be the living Lord my friend, 

Then my bliss shall never end.” 

He put his arm round her tenderly. “ Do you be¬ 
lieve all this?” he murmured. 

“Believe it? Of course,” she answered. “It is 
your religion. Don’t you ?” 

“But how does it make you feel?” he continued, 
ignoring her question, which reopened such an old, 
deep wound. 

She put down her sewing and pressed her hands 
against her heart. 

“ It makes me feel—it makes me feel—” She hesi¬ 
tated, finding no words, either in her own language 
or in English, to express that strange and wonderful 
radiance which fills the heart recently awakened to a 


THE JOURNEY THAT WAS ARRANGED. 


3°3 


repentant and transforming conviction that the atone¬ 
ment made by the man-god cleanseth from all sin. 
She could find no words ; and turning toward him, 
she flung her arms around his neck and, hiding her 
face in his bosom, burst into tears, exclaiming 
brokenly : 

“ It makes me feel like that.” 

“ Ad we ! Ad we!” 

It was all he could say, straining her gently to him, 
and stroking the wavy disorder of her hair. Fre¬ 
quently, during his studies as a divinity student, and 
his experience as a clergyman, had he witnessed 
among the very young some such outbreak as this 
upon that first impulsive sense of guilt and unworthi¬ 
ness that pervades the heart during the experience 
known as conversion. He knew how almost mor¬ 
bidly tender the feelings become at such a time, and 
those images of the smoking flax and the bruised 
reed, which he had employed in his own discourses, 
re-arose before him as he continued stroking Adwe’s 
hair and whispering words of reassurance. At the 
same time he writhed in a bitterness of spirit far more 
poignant than she was ever doomed to know. He 
remembered having read of the curious and unavail¬ 
ing remorse which swept for an instant over some 
great man—Napoleon, as it seemed to him, though 
he was not certain—who, having reached a throne 
through a sea of blood, frothed at the mouth at the 
sound of village church-bells chiming at evening— 
those church-bells he had heard when a boy, un¬ 
visited by any but innocent and distant dreams of 
fame and glory. He had some such silent remorse 
as this , for though no deed of cruelty or hideous self- 



THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


304 

ishness had stained his life, he often asked himself 
whether, before leaving his pulpit and his church, he 
had fully demonstrated that anything better than the 
Christian religion awaited him in the shoreless ocean 
of unbelief upon which he had set sail. 

Subdued by these tender memories, he listened to 
Adwe while she poured forth to him, in her artless 
manner, the story of the strange peace and happiness 
she had recently found. 

“ Now I know,” she said, “why you are so good. 
It is because you have believed all your life as I do 
now. But why did you not tell me ? Why did you 
let me worship idols when there is only one living 
and true God ?” 

Searching question! He found himself unable to 
reply, yet would not turn away his eyes from hers, 
which looked into them with such questioning love. 
How could he crush this snow-white blossom of 
Christian faith that, despite him, had so suddenly 
sprung up in such a lovely soil? How could he tell 
her that this religion she had adopted was scarcely 
more in his eyes than the paganism in which she had 
been reared ? How could he state to her that the 
Being emblemed by the figure upon the crucifix was 
as powerless to help her as the Siva before whom she 
had been taught to bow ? For a moment he sus¬ 
pected that all her life her own rare nature had in¬ 
stigated her to adore an unseen force, symbolled in 
the uncouth images that abounded upon India’s 
countless shrines ; that this natural spirituality had 
prepared her to become a facile convert; and that he 
would have been justified in saying, as St. Paul had 
said upon another occasion, “ Whom, therefore, ye 


THE JOURNEY THAT WAS ARRANGED. 305 

ignorantly worship, Him declare I unto you.” But 
circumstances had accomplished the proselytism he 
would have refused even to attempt. Adwe remained 
looking at him, mistaking his silence simply for a 
good-tempered refusal to defend himself. Presently 
she added, in her pleading voice of absolute faith and 
trust, like a child addressing a being very wise, very 
loving, and very good : 

“ Teach me all you know. Make me to love Him 
just as you love Him—for I want to be just like you.” 

Something like a shudder seemed to seize him. 

“Adwe ! Adwe !” he again repeated, filled with an 
emotion which could find vent only in the broken 
repetition of her beautiful, melodious name. They 
remained thus for a long time, locked in an embrace 
that spirits might have envied who had never known 
the dross of earthly sense. And all through that 
sweet morning—the sweetest that they ever were to 
pass—he spoke with her as if once again he were at 
St. Remigius administering to some Saviour-seeking 
penitent, and gave her water from the eternal spring, 
and fed her with the bread of life. 


If Mr. John Earle Benton had not had a reputa¬ 
tion for yacht-selling, Marmaduke would not have 
entertained the project of making an application, 
however remote and indirect. As it was, he was able, 
through Mr. Loveridge, to further such inquiries as 
were necessary without appearing in the matter him¬ 
self. It may seem a strange matter for a missionary 
to concern himself in ; but Mr. Loveridge—of whom 
the course of our story has enabled the reader to 


3°6 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


catch only the merest glimpse—was a man of much 
refinement, intelligence, and knowledge of the social 
world ; had seen a great deal of the rich and easy 
side of life in his younger days ; and at Benares was 
made welome at the houses of wealthy Hindoos and 
the palaces of native princes who had wandered far 
enough from the idols and superstitions of their 
fathers to look kindly upon the Christian religion and 
its followers. His name was known to many of the 
Europeans and Americans of note who chanced to 
visit that locality, and his geniality and accomplish¬ 
ments as a gentleman were the reverse of that side 
of the medallion which represented him as simply a 
missionary. He therefore had opportunities of mak¬ 
ing inquiries Marmaduke might have sought in vain 
in quarters which, at first sight, would have appeared 
more promising; and the result was that Marmaduke 
learned that Mr Benton might not be averse to sell¬ 
ing, provided anybody would be foolish enough to 
give him the very large sum he asked. If foolishness 
consisted in being willing to give for a thing a sum 
proportionate to the buyer’s desire for it, though in 
excess of the average market value, Marmaduke pos¬ 
sessed just the requisite unwisdom at that time. A 
meeting between him and Mr. Benton was effected, 
the latter visited the palace, glad to meet a country¬ 
man of whom he had heard so much, and not sorry 
to enjoy a hospitality which brought him face to face 
with a New Yorker. The price was agreed upon. The 
date when the yacht should become Marmaduke’s was 
arranged—it was within a month after the murderous 
attempt of the Brahmins. Without entering into un¬ 
necessary details, Marmaduke made it clear to Mr. 


THE JOURNEY THAT WAS ARRANGED. 


3°7 


Benton that he wanted the transfer effected as quietly 
as possible, so as to excite the minimum of attention 
and comment. It was understood, therefore, that on 
an appointed day, all preliminaries having been ad¬ 
justed, the yacht should ascend the Ganges to a point 
near the foot of the garden, Marmaduke meanwhile 
completing arrangements for the speedy shipment of 
everything he designed to take with him. In this 
rapid embarkation he would find it necessary to leave 
behind a good deal that he would like to carry away 
at the moment; but here, again, he could use the de¬ 
voted Mr. Loveridge, and trust to him to make a final 
disposal of various effects which he would have pre¬ 
ferred to superintend in person. For though Mr. 
Loveridge’s views of morality, imposed by his re¬ 
ligion, would have made it impossible for him to ap¬ 
prove or abet certain features in Marmaduke’s recent 
course of life, there was nothing in those convictions 
to forbid his making such inquiries as Marmaduke 
could not well make himself, or rendering the young 
man a few practical services after he should have 
left the country. The influence which Mr. Loveridge 
exerted, and which Marmaduke felt, was that of a 
meek and quiet spirit, a lovely and lowly life. It 
did not consist in laying down rigid principles and 
measuring with an iron rule. Adwe had frequently 
spoken with him, and loved him with a frank and 
childlike glee. 

Every preparation was made with as much secrecy 
and quietness as possible. The evening preceding 
the dawn at which they were to leave arrived. Mar¬ 
maduke wandered through the palace, taking what 
he believed to be a last look at objects, many of 


3°8 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


which had become endeared to him through asso- 
ciation, and most of which served to remind him 
that he was thousands of miles away from the civili¬ 
zation amid which he had been reared. But causes 
he afterwards found it impossible to unearth were at 
that very moment in operation to render it quite im¬ 
possible for him to leave Benares at the projected 
time. As he descended from the room of stone and 
cedar where he had first met the fakir, he encoun¬ 
tered Mr. Loveridge, who was to stay there over 
night, and who now came hastening toward him 
with an anxious expression. Mr. Loveridge ex¬ 
plained that as he passed that portion of the house 
occupied by Adwe, he had heard a sudden and sharp 
cry issue thence. He thought, but was not certain, 
that the voice was Adwe’s. Marmaduke’s cheek 
blanched. Full of a hundred fears, he rushed to the 
zenana, unlocked the door, pulled aside the curtains, 
and entered. There he saw a spectacle before which 
all his courage vanished like a handful of straw con¬ 
sumed in a seven-times heated furnace. 


THE JOURNEY THAT WAS TAKEN, 


3° 9 


CHAPTER XX. 

THE JOURNEY THAT WAS TAKEN. 

Adw£ was lying upon the floor, the back of het 
head resting against a low divan which she had 
struck in falling. Beside her lay a delicate glass 
goblet broken into pieces, the ground stained with 
the remains of the liquid it had held. Her eyes 
were wild and fixed, as though searching for some¬ 
thing in space, and she uttered low moans continu¬ 
ally. Wordless in his terror, while at the same in¬ 
stant a hideous suspicion darted into his mind, 
Marmaduke raised her, and stretched her tenderly 
upon the couch. He noticed upon a small table 
near by, another goblet, precisely like the one broken. 
Beside it stood a fantastic Indian pitcher, which he 
saw contained the iced sherbet he and Adwe were in 
the habit of drinking quite frequently. This pitcher 
and these goblets were never washed by any other 
person than herself, and when not in use were kept 
in a little ebony cabinet, which stood on one side of 
the room. It was one of the numerous minor pre¬ 
cautions that had been observed, in order to guard 
against such a possibility as now appeared to have 
made itself a fact. 

It was useless to question Adwe. The subtle 
poison she had undoubtedly swallowed had some 
time ago begun to produce its effect. In the cold 


3io 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


perspiration which he wiped from her forehead, in 
those convulsions of the body which spoke of mad¬ 
dening physical pain, and in that burning gaze, 
jneveronce fixed upon him, and betraying an utter un¬ 
consciousness of the proper relation of visible things, 
he read the action of some frightful drug, for which 
instinct told him no antidote existed. Recovering 
his self-possession, and unwilling at that moment 
to trust any one of the servants in his establishment, 
though most of them were Mohammedans, he called 
Mr. Loveridge and bade him procure first, as instan¬ 
taneously as possible, an English physician—men¬ 
tioning the name—who had lived long at Benares, 
and was acquainted with the habits and manners of 
the natives ; and then to go to headquarters and give 
information of the crime that in all probability had 
been committed. The good man hastened away. 
He had taken all Marmaduke’s grief and care upon 
his shoulders. He was one of those friends who in¬ 
spire and justify the confidence that every obligation 
thus accepted will be as perfectly performed as it 
would have been by the one who imposed it. 

While awaiting the doctor’s arrival, Marmaduke 
remained alone with Adwe, seeking in vain to give 
her relief, and sometimes trying to win her into 
recognition of him. He had not left the zenana since 
entering it, and the only alteration he made of any 
amount was to remove the pitcher and the unbroken 
goblet from the stand to the cabinet, in which he 
locked them, taking out the key. He could only 
conjecture that his custom of drinking sherbet with 
Adwe had become known to one of the servants, and 
that one of these, admitted to the zenana, as was daily 


THE JOURNEY THAT WAS TAKEN. 


3” 


necessary, had, with secret rapidity, poured a poison 
into the pitcher as it stood in the cabinet, which was 
generally kept unlocked, and had trusted to the sher¬ 
bet's being made without a previous examination 
of the pitcher. He had no doubt that the poison had 
been furnished by one of the Brahmins, and he had 
of course as little doubt that the design had been 
to kill him as well as Adwe, since they always took 
this drink together at the same time. That day 
matters had been topsy-turvy. The servants had 
divined that something unusual was on foot. A 
good deal of luggage stood in the garden, waiting to 
be carried on board the yacht. It must have been 
amid this confusion and the incident coming and 
going that the poison had been applied to its fatal 
purpose, the Brahmins trusting to the favor, of Siva 
to bring the thing to a favorable conclusion for 
them, but doubtless holding something else in reserve 
should this means fail. How the fact of his con¬ 
templated departure had leaked out, or which of the 
servants had been the instrument of the Brahmins’ 
revenge, Marmaduke could not determine. 

After a lapse of time, which to his strained imagi¬ 
nation seemed greatly to exceed what was requisite, 
the physician arrived. He was an old man who had 
lived for nearly half a century in Hindoostan. Mr. 
Loveridge had briefly stated the case to him. He 
listened attentively to the little that Marmaduke could 
add. Then he looked attentively at Adwe, whose 
moans and convulsions had now become feebler, but 
whose eyes still continued to question unintelligently 
the darkening space into which her spirit seemed 
about to enter. If for a moment they roamed over 


3 12 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


Marmaduke’s features, they gave no hint of recogni¬ 
tion. 

The doctor turned and looked at Marmaduke. He 
was a nervous man, short, slender of build, with cold 
blue eyes, pale white face, and scrubby beard, in 
which gray struggled with red; but he was an ex¬ 
cellent physician, one of the best among the foreign 
residents that Benares could boast. He shook his 
head gravely. 

“ Nothing can be done,” he said. 

“ How long will it last?” asked Marmaduke, insen¬ 
sible, for the time, to the anguish that awaited him, 
and anxious only that the suffering he witnessed 
should be over as soon as possible. 

“ Only a little while.” 

“ Will she regain consciousness ?” 

“ It is possible. She may have a lucid interval. 
You say you have the liquid of which she drank ? 
Let me see it.” 

Marmaduke brought the pitcher. The doctor 
poured some into a glass, and then dropped into the 
glass part of the contents of a small phial he took 
from his medicine-case. In an instant the sherbet in 
the glass changed in color. 

“ It is as I thought,” said the doctor. “ It is a 
bish.* There can be no recovery, no alleviation, ex¬ 
cepting such as will accelerate death by inducing 
unconsciousness.” 

“ Then there is absolutely nothing that can be 
done ?” 

“ Nothing—nothing.” 

The doctor sat glancing at him and at Adwe with 


* Hindoo word for deadly poison. 



THE JOURNEY THAT WAS TAKEN. 


313 


that tranquil benevolence in which no compassion 
can be detected, and which is the result of wide pro¬ 
fessional experience, acquainted with almost every 
kind and degree of sickness humanity endures. He 
went away, and Marmaduke and the dying girl were 
once more left alone. Mr. Loveridge had not yet 
returned. 

Marmaduke sat beside her, wiping away the per¬ 
spiration that beaded her brow and the light froth 
that occasionally gathered on her lips. Night was 
now come, and he had lit a shaded lamp that cast 
its soft radiance near. As he raised one of her hands, 
which had grown cold, a gentle pressure caused him 
to look with questioning intentness upon her face, 
and there he saw, for the first time, a gleam of re¬ 
turning intelligence. She fixed her eyes upon him 
long and earnestly, and a vague motion pervaded her 
body, as though she would have sprung toward him 
if she could. He knelt down beside her, passing one 
of her arms around his neck, and bent his ear close 
to her lips. Bending so, he heard her whisper that 
terrible question, almost the last words she uttered: 

“ Is it true ?” 

Oh, the agony of the effort to choke down that con¬ 
vulsive sob ! 

“Yes, Adwe, it is true.” 

“Did Jesus Christ die for me?” 

“ Yes, Adwe—for you, for me, for all of us.” 

“ Shall we meet again ?” 

He was silent. Beneath the shudder that came 
over him he felt the colder shudder of the dying 
mortal he was holding so tenderly to his bosom. 

She pushed his head gently up, so that she might 


THE LADY OF CAWNPjORE. 


3M 

see his face. Her hands stole over his cheeks and 
strove to pat them gently as, their eyes closely star¬ 
ing into each other’s, she repeated almost inaudibly: 

“ Shall we meet again ?” 

“ Yes! yes ! yes !” came from him with a wild cry 
he could no longer repress. “ Darling, do you w r ant 
to die believing in Jesus Christ as your Saviour and 
Redeemer ?” 

She bowed her head. She could no longer speak. 

He gently released her, and dipping his hand in 
some fresh water that stood in a vase close by, knelt 
once more beside her and said in a low voice, in which 
the cadences of a thousand melting memories were 
mingled : 

“ Adwe, I baptize thee in the name of the Father, 
and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.” 
Then with his moistened finger he made the sign of 
the Cross upon her forehead. 

The eyes remained fixed upon him. Bodily pain 
seemed to have vanished. In the vain effort again to 
speak, a soft, inarticulate, happy murmur escaped 
her lips, like that which a tired child makes who 
gladly turns to sleep when day is over. There was a 
recurrence of the same motion in the body, as though 
the impulse to caress and be caressed were the last 
she were to feel. Again he passed one of her arms 
around his neck, holding her in his. A smile illumi¬ 
nated her face with its olden beauty. Their lips 
touched. In touching he felt hers in motion, and 
interrupted his kiss to guess rather than to know he 
heard her say: 

“ Tell me the old, old story.” 

He stooped to give her one kiss more. Why did 


THE JOURNEY THAT WAS TAKEN. 315 

he draw quickly away? Why did he press back those 
tender lids with a pressure that was almost violent, 
and peer yet deeper into those eyes which a moment 
before— 

- With a loud cry he threw himself across the unre¬ 
sponsive form. He did not hear the noisy knocking 
at the door, which proclaimed that Mr. Loveridge and 
the police agents had arrived. The knocking ceased. 
Those outside heard no sound from within. But 
from the bowed figure went up the scarcely coherent 
cry: 

“ My God ! My God ! Why hast Thou forsaken 


3i6 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


CHAPTER XXI. 

“ THE DEWDROP SLIPS INTO THE SHINING SEA.” 

It was sunset of the next day. At the foot of the 
antique garden, which for centuries had scarcely 
altered its outlines, stood a funeral pyre, built after 
the fashion of the Hindoos. Over it had been scat¬ 
tered those resins and aromatic oils which are used to 
feed and quicken the flames, in order that they may 
accomplish as speedily as possible the work they have 
to do. In India the hours which elapse between 
death and the final obsequies are necessarily few—in 
some cases very few. Marmaduke had given the 
matter as much thought as the comparatively short 
interval would permit, and had finally resolved to 
adopt the Hindoo method of disposing of the dead; 
not oiit of deference to the country in which he was 
living, but simply because it afforded him the means 
of putting the remains of Adwe out of the reach of 
possible profanation. He knew that among this 
people, who unite in such a singular manner some of 
the highest refinements of civilization with some of 
the lowest instincts of savagery, a bayadere, when she 
dies, is burned with great pomp and apparent honor ; 
but that in many cases when the flames have only 
partly performed their duty, the body, half-consumed, 
is thrown to hungry jackals, as though to emblem, 


“the dewurop slips into the shining sea.” 317 

even after death, the splendor and the degradation 
of the dancing-girl’s career. Whatever the origin of 
this custom, and whatever furtive motive lay beneath 
it, he knew enough of the Brahmins to be aware that 
they would want to possess themselves of Adwe’s 
body, and it was to guard against the possibility of 
this that he had chosen incineration as the only per¬ 
fect method of quickly disposing of it. 

In carrying out this intention it almost seemed to 
him as though he had been secretly, silently, and offi¬ 
cially abetted, though he could not say—ce'rtainly he 
could not in the condition in which his faculties then 
were—from what quarter this abetment first eman¬ 
ated. Could he have analyzed his emotions, he would 
have perhaps said that he experienced the same feel¬ 
ing of being obscurely protected that had, during the 
last few months, visited him several times. The pro¬ 
tection had been inadequate, it is true, for it had not 
prevented the frightful experiment made with the 
cobras, and it had not been able to avert the fatal 
poison. But it seemed as though his palace were, at 
this particular time, being more strictly guarded than 
it would have been natural in a foreigner to expect, 
and no attempt was made by the Brahmins to inter¬ 
fere with these last ceremonies, news of which must 
have reached them. Officers, detailed for special 
service by the police department, watched every en¬ 
trance to the house, and Marmaduke was allowed to 
complete these final preparations with no intimation 
from any quarter that the slightest disturbance would 
occur. 

The preparations were all concluded now. The 
services of the church, Mr. Loveridge presiding, had 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


318 

been held inside the room where Marmaduke and 
Adwe had passed so many tranquil hours. Her body, 
attired in the dress of which she had been fondest in 
life,—a simple white gown that was a compromise be¬ 
tween the English and the Indian fashion,—had been 
placed within a casket made invisible with roses and 
other flowers, which dropped in many a fragrant fes¬ 
toon, whose trailing green swept the floor and filled 
the air with a fresh aroma. No one had been present 
excepting Marmaduke and his attached old friend. 
With reverent feelings, by which he had not been 
visited for many a day, Marmaduke accompanied him 
through the service, recollecting how he himself had 
been the presiding minister on not a few occasions in 
a past not yet remote, and wondering, in a dumb and 
dazed sort of way, what was to be the issue out of 
the new loneliness that was about to fall upon him. 
The service over, he and Mr. Loveridge carried the 
casket containing the light burden to the pyre, which 
had meanwhile been prepared, and now all that re¬ 
mained was to apply the torch and watch the flames 
perform a task at which they had no rival. 

Marmaduke made a slight gesture, signifying to 
Mr. Loveridge that he wished to be left alone. The 
old missionary descended the pyre and stood out of 
sight at its foot. Marmaduke remained for a few 
moments, looking intently at the features which, after 
those of Beatrice, had become the dearest to him on 
earth. He thought it no profanation to either of 
these two women—so widely separated by nearly 
everything that can make two women unlike—for his 
memories of both of them to mingle at that hour. He 
gently felt the tender oval of the face, and caught for 


“the dewdrop slips into the SHINING SEA.” 319 

the last time a glimpse of what the lids concealed— 
lids that had so often been opened wide that the 
black and violet light of her speechful eyes might 
pour upon him in its questioning flood. He laid his 
cheek against her cheek, and thought all those un¬ 
utterably bitter thoughts that throng through the 
heart at such a time, when the soul calls upon eter¬ 
nity and infinity to speak for it and voice the anguish 
that can afflict one impotent, pitiful human life. He 
had brought with him the crucifix which had first 
awakened Adwe’s interest and led her to inquire 
about the pathway to the Christian heaven. He 
placed it, now, beneath her crossed hands, so that, as 
she lay there, as though sleeping in the sinking sun¬ 
set, she seemed to be straining the emblem of salva¬ 
tion gently to her breast. Then he turned and went 
away, pausing for an instant ere he descended the 
pyre, and casting back one look of ineffable wistful¬ 
ness upon that deep repose. 

Reaching the ground, he seized the torch Mr. Lov- 
eridge handed him, and set fire to the light, dry, com¬ 
bustible materials of which the structure consisted. 
In an instant the crackling flames leaped from the 
four corners which he had successively ignited, and 
favored by a gentle breeze from the river, and feed¬ 
ing upon the sweet-smelling oils and gums, joined 
their forces high in the air, surcharging with fragrant 
incense the cloud that crowned them. If any other 
eyes watched than Marmaduke’s and Mr. Loveridge’s, 
they were those of passers-by upon the river, or of 
the servants of the palace peering from a distance. 
In a few moments the flames, like animals seeking 
their prey, attacked, as by common agreement, the 


320 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


white-robed figure in the midst of them. Mr. Lover- 
idge drew near to Marmaduke and, taking him by the 
hand, spoke a word of entreaty to him, and made a ges¬ 
ture as though he would lead him away. But Mar¬ 
maduke, disengaging himself softly, shook his head 
with an almost imperceptible motion, and remained 
looking with unflinching eyes upon the flames, which, 
in the results they were accomplishing, more nearly 
resembled the process of extinction than anything 
else of which we can conceive. Presently, the mis¬ 
sionary still bearing him company, he sat down upon 
a neighboring bench, and there continued to watch 
the fire burn itself out. As it did so, the fire of day 
was also extinguished. The sun went down, and the 
two watchers were left alone with the silence and the 
early stars. 

Some hours after, a boat put out from the foot of 
the garden and was rowed swiftly into the middle 
of the river. There were two occupants—an old man 
and a young. The young man held the oars. The 
old one bore in his hands a heavy and costly vase. 
When the middle of the river was reached, the boat 
paused and the young man, taking the vase, scat¬ 
tered the ashes it contained, a little at a time, upon 
the shining water, and watched them as they disap¬ 
peared beneath the surface. When all were gone, he 
held the vase a few moments to his bosom, as though 
giving it a last caress, and dropping it into the sacred 
stream, peered over the side of the boat as if to watch 
its descent. The ashes thus reverently scattered 
had once been the body of Adwe. It had seemed 
meet to Marmaduke that amid the majestic mel¬ 
ancholy of murmurous midnight all that remained 


“the dewdrop slips into the shining sea/’ 321 

of her should in this manner become re-inwrought 
into the fabric of the universe. 

“ She died, but not alone; she held within 
A second principle of life which might 
Have dawned a fair and sinless child of sin, 

But closed its little being without light, 

And went down to the grave unborn, wherein 
Blossom and bough lie withered with one blight. 

In vain the dews of heaven descend above 
The bleeding flower and blasted fruit of love.” 




322 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


CHAPTER XXII. 

MARMADUKE TAKES A DRIVE. 

The condition of silent and uncomplaining despair 
into which Marmaduke now fell excited the deepest 
compassion in the breast of Mr. Loveridge, the only- 
one near him who took any profound interest in his 
welfare, or would in any circumstances have ex¬ 
hausted every effort to minister to his solace. But 
even Mr. Loveridge failed to extract from him more 
than a word or a look. The missionary could not 
entrap him into any argument, and all the ingenious 
efforts he made to irritate him out of his apathy com¬ 
pletely failed. Aware how delicate is the task of 
offering consolation, the old man’s attempts in that 
direction were few, and made with the utmost skill 
and judgment. But they, too, fell to the ground. 
He soon saw that only one of those powerful shocks, 
which time alone is apt'to bring around, could startle 
the young man into action, and make him cease to 
brood over a loss so remediless. 

Day after day Marmaduke sat alone in the large 
apartment which had been Adwe’s favorite retreat. 
He remained for hours in one position, his eyes fixed 
upon objects that he did not see, his ears unconscious 
of sounds remote or near, lost to everything except¬ 
ing the consciousness of hopeless sorrow. These sol¬ 
itary reveries, that resembled the waking ecstasy 


MARMADUKE TAKES A DRIVE. 323 

into which yogis* are prone to plunge, were inter¬ 
rupted only by the visits of Mr. Loveridge, or by a 
servant bringing food, or coming for orders. As was 
to have been expected, the presence of the police 
agents in the palace had not resulted in obtaining 
any clue to the murder, and Marmaduke was now 
indifferent as to whether his own life was attempted 
or not. He abandoned all the precautions that for 
Adwe’s sake he had adopted, and deliberately laid 
aside the weapons he had been accustomed to carry 
about his person. He often passed an entire day 
without food, and when he ate or drank it was with 
an absolute forgetfulness of the possibility that the 
same means which had put an end to Adwe might 
be successfully employed against himself. If such a 
thought ever did occur to him, it is certain that he 
welcomed it; for he could see nothing, now, that 
made it worth while to live. 

A thorough examination had been made of the 
numerous servants in the palace, but one and all 
vehemently denied any knowledge of the poison, or 
of the means by which it could have been got into 
the house. It was evident that nothing could be 
gleaned from that quarter, and after a few days the 
tragedy became one of those innumerable mysteries 
with which the annals of private life in India abound. 
None of the Brahmin priests, with whose pagoda 
Adwe had formerly been connected, could be proven 
in the least implicated, and all of them professed the 
profoundest abhorrence for the crime. The chemi¬ 
cal analysis made of the sherbet by the physician 


* Brahmins who have passed the third degree of initiation. 



324 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


Marmaduke had employed, showed that the poison 
used had been a mixture of that obtained from the 
upas tree, with something still more subtle and malef¬ 
icent, that was beyond identification. No antidote 
could have reached it, and its effect was invariably as 
speedy as fatal. 

In the midst of his silent melancholy, the most 
hopeless characteristics of which were that it never 
vented itself in invective against destiny, and that it 
was totally without complaint, a new thought pre¬ 
sented itself. In his search after happiness, all of 
which had ended in such bitter misery, how was it 
that the insanity in his blood had never yet asserted 
itself? Truly he had been called upon to endure 
incalculably greater trials than would have been his 
had he married the woman of his choice and brought 
upon himself the cares of paternity; yes, even though 
to these had been added the struggle with poverty. 
Was it possible, after all, that this innate tendency 
was so feebly developed or so obscure that no excit¬ 
ing cause, however great, would be sufficient to give 
it growth ? Like so many afflictions of the kind, was 
it showing, in him, a disposition to skip one genera¬ 
tion, only to break out with greater potency in the 
next, should there be a next ? Had he done wisely, 
after all, in breaking from Beatrice, when the fact 
that he had already endured so many sufferings un¬ 
scathed argued that his mental and nervous organi¬ 
zation might possess at least the average integrity ? 
This thought repeated itself with tantalizing perti- i 
nacity, so that the relief he experienced, at first, in 
concluding that his intellect was normal in its capac¬ 
ity to endure, was more than balanced by the subse- 


marmaduke takes a drive. 325 

quent suspicion that his eagerness to seize upon such 
solace proved the inherent debility of which Dr. 
Billington had informed him. These reflections were 
the only ones that ruffled his apathy. To the ob¬ 
server he was the snow-clad volcano apparently 
extinct. To himself he was the fire in its entrails. 

He was destined to be aroused, however, from the 
motionless and murky gloom with which he sat en¬ 
compassed. Occasionally he received letters from 
friends in the United States; but the instrument of 
his awakening was not a letter, but a newspaper 
which arrived from New York. It was addressed to 
him in a hand he did not recognize, and its delivery 
had evidently been delayed, for it was directed merely, 
“ Mr. Marmaduke Allan, Benares, Hindoostan,” with 
no closer designation of his locality. He was about 
to toss it aside unopened, but the strangeness of the 
handwriting on the wrapper arrested him. It was a 
hand which he had never seen before : a small, irregu¬ 
lar, feminine hand, which had evidently struggled in 
the formation of such unfamiliar words as “ Benares” 
and “ Hindoostan.” If he had ever seen Mrs. Min¬ 
cer’s handwriting, he might possibly have recollected 
it ; and if he had recollected it, he would have 
known at once that the newspaper had been addressed 
and mailed by her. He opened it, and as he turned 
over its pages listlessly, wondering in an absent way 
why a stranger should care to send him a New York 
journal, he saw in one corner, surrounded with an 
irregular scrawl of writing-ink, a paragraph which 
instantly caused him to know that he had not yet 
suffered so much that further suffering was impos¬ 
sible. The paragraph read as follows : 


326 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


“ Mr. George Billington, son of the celebrated 
alienist, Dr. Erasmus Billington, is betrothed to Miss 
Beatrice Orme. The marriage will take place on the 
13th of March next. Tt will be remembered that 
Miss Orme was formerly the fiancee of the Rev. Mar- 
maduke Allan, whose resignation from the Church of 
St. Remigius created so much comment in the relig¬ 
ious circles of this city about a year and a half ago.” 

He crushed the paper in his hands and remained 
for a few moments rigid and staring. Then he 
jumped up and paced the floor in a hurricane of 
emotion, the first he had manifested since Adwe's 
obsequies. The sacrifice he had made then had 
brought forth this result. The man who, of all his 
intimate acquaintances, he would have been least 
willing for Beatrice to marry, was to become her 
husband. Not that he cherished any special ani¬ 
mosity to George. But he understood his character. 
He knew that he was selfish, sensual, and shallow, 
entirely incapable of giving adequate companion¬ 
ship to a girl like Beatrice. He wondered by what 
subtle process she had come to consent to this 
union. He could not bring himself to believe she 
loved George ; and if not, by what mysterious rea¬ 
soning had she been prevailed upon to accept him! 
He did not know of the misfortune that had befallen 
Mrs. Orme. He did not know that the chief source 
of her income had been destroyed, and that it was as 
impossible for her to live unrepiningly in poverty as it 
-is for a flower to bloom in fulness of beauty when 
deprived of sunlight and warmth. Being in total 
ignorance of this,—for none of the letters he had 
opened, and he had not opened all, informed him of 


MARMADUKE TAKES A DRIVE. 327 

it,—how could he guess that hourly observation of 
her mother’s plaintive misery had finally worn into 
the repugnance and aversion of Beatrice, and induced 
her to consent to this marriage as the only remedy 
possible ? 

* He paused in his rapid strides, and brought all the 
strength of which he was capable to bear upon his 
present position, so as to look as calmly as possible 
upon the future that stretched before him. It ap¬ 
peared bleak and barren in the extreme. How 
should he bear it? It was to be without hove, and 
he was by nature framed for love, miserable without 
it, happy only in bestowing it and having it bestowed. 
In what sphere of activity could he expect to find 
that repose which should serve him instead of hap¬ 
piness ? There were many evils in the world to 
reform. But was he the one to reform them, even 
with extensive riches at his command? His was 
not one of those cold ambitious natures which can 
ignore the softest emotion and find gratification in 
obeying the dictates of boundless egoism. To what, 
then, should he turn? The most refined debauch¬ 
eries which human imagination can invent, and which 
unlimited wealth can exhaust itself in supplying, 
pall after a little while, and the enervated soul 
yearns for something beyond mortality to yield. 
Besides, the spiritual part of him would not permit 
him to abandon himself without reserve to those 
pleasures in which the higher nature takes no part. 
And as for love, since the noblest kind, with its highest 
satisfactions, was denied him, and since nothing was 
more unlikely than that another Adwe awaited him 
in the near or distant future, the most prudent thing 


328 


THE.LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


for him to do was to shut his heart to the suggestion 
of passion, and reverently cherish those memories 
which had now taken their place among the most 
sacred upon earth. 

It was well that he had stopped to concentrate his 
faculties, for if he had not he would have been stag¬ 
gered by the focussing of so many and such sore 
perplexities. He stood with his hand pressed upon 
his heart, gazing at them, so to speak, as though they 
were something tangible and visible. That question 
flitted before him which so often flits before human 
beings when they are blown upon by tempests from 
every quarter, and find no shelter for the head, no 
comfort for the heart. Why should he be thus 
tried ? Why was nature so pitiless ? Why did not 
something occur to extricate him from his dilemma? 
Why should he not take his fate in his own hands 
and go, unsummoned from the world ? 

He crossed the apartment in order to lock himself 
in, after giving orders that he should not be inter¬ 
rupted. The hours of midday, usually devoted to the 
siesta, were passed, and sunset was approaching; but 
he had spent those hours in painful and lonely 
brooding, and now he was willing to seek forgetful¬ 
ness in sleep. To his surprise, the servant who 
answered his summons handed him the card of a 
visitor who had that moment arrived, and who was 
waiting in an anteroom. Indisposed to see any one, 
Marmaduke glanced irritably at the card. It bore 
the name of one to whom he could not deny him¬ 
self—Mr. Saja Sujeetra, the young man whom he had 
observed regarding him so attentively after their in¬ 
troduction to each other at the English judge’s 



MARMADUKE TAKES A DRIVE. 


329 


private office. Thinking that Mr. Sujeetra must have 
called to see him about some possible discovery 
made by the police, Marmaduke went to him instantly 
and welcomed him cordially. 

Again he noticed the gleam of interest and curi¬ 
osity which the young Hindoo threw upon him. He 
had so often attracted this interest on account of the 
fabulous wealth imputed to him, that he ascribed it 
now entirely to that, and began to feel the contempt 
which such vulgar deference cannot but excite. 

“ I have come to ask you to take a drive,” said Mr. 
Sujeetra, making use of the excellent English he had 
at his disposal. Then seeing a refusal written on 
Marmaduke’s forehead, he continued: 

“I want you to see my house, or rather the house 
where I live when I am at home. The drive is long, 
but it will not be very hot. You shall have dinner 
there. If you will stay all night I shall be delighted. 
If you had rather not, you will find the drive back in 
the cool of the evening agreeable rather than the 
reverse.” 

The tone in which this was said was so winning 
that Marmaduke felt a disposition to yield. But he 
had become so accustomed to nursing his grief that 
he resented any disturbance of it almost as an intru¬ 
sion. He was, of course, too courteous to allow this 
resentment to become visible, and he explained in a 
few polite words that for the present he was a hermit 
going nowhere and seeing no one. 

Mr. Sujeetra looked at him with concern. 

“ I hope you will reconsider your determination,” 
he answered, in tones of more than ordinary sym¬ 
pathy. “If you will do me this favor,—for it will be 


33° 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


a very great favor,—I can answer for it that you will 
meet one person besides myself—and you will meet 
only that one—who has the greatest sympathy for 
your misfortunes, and who would be glad to extend 
to you whatever service is possible. That much,” he 
added, after a moment’s reflection, “I am instructed 
to say.” 

Marmaduke gazed at him wonderingly. His lips 
almost framed the question, “Instructed ?” 

“ Yes,—instructed,” answered Mr. Sujeetra, smiling 
pensively. “I cannot say more at present; but the 
carriage is here. It will be a two hours’ drive. A 
great part of the way is shaded; and—and I am sure 
you will not regret it.” 

Again that peculiar gaze, in which admiration was 
blended with deference. Marmaduke thought for a 
moment. Upon that day two things had occurred to 
shake him from his torpor: first the newspaper, then 
this singular invitation. He found it impossible to 
slip back instantly into his quiescent state, just as a 
person placed under a shower-bath finds it impos¬ 
sible to withstand the glowing tingle that spreads 
over the skin. 

“ Thanks,” he said presently. “ I accept with 
pleasure, and I will be with you in a moment.” 

“What you need is consolation,” said Sujeetra, 
after they were in the carriage. “ Perhaps you will 
find it where I am taking you.” 

Marmaduke gazed at him in silent astonishment, 
and as they proceeded he wondered more and more. 


THE UNSEEN HAND. 


331 


CHAPTER XXIII. 

. THE UNSEEN HAND. 

The drive was taken in a barouche, which, while 
it afforded them protection from the sun, allowed free 
play to whatever air was stirring. Neither Marma- 
duke nor Mr. Sujeetra talked a great deal, and when 
they did their conversation had reference to indiffer¬ 
ent matters. Marmaduke did not feel moved to say 
much upon any subject, and Sujeetra, who was, of 
course, fully acquainted with the recent melancholy 
events, rightly judged it better not to make too ener¬ 
getic efforts to call him out of himself. 

They reached, at last, extensive gardens shut in by 
a stone wall, and entered through a massive gateway. 
As they drove through the beautifully cultivated 
grounds, where great clumps of flowers sparkled like 
enormous brooches composed of a hundred glittering 
gems, Marmaduke saw at a little distance the out¬ 
lines of a large house, or rather palace, as it would 
there have been called, built of stone and several 
stories in height. Sujeetra had talked of taking him 
to his home, and Marmaduke asked himself how it 
was that a man so wealthy as the ownership, or even 
the occupancy, of this mansion would seem to imply 
should accept a position so comparatively humble as 
that which Sujeetra filled in the office of the judge. 


332 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


He was not acquainted with all the phenomena of 
Anglo-Indian civilization 

Once inside the house, at the portal of which they 
were met by numerous servants, Marmaduke soon 
perceived that all that was best in Hindoo art, and 
all that was best in European, had combined to render 
the appointments perfectly fitted to the environment 
in which they were. He had been in the palaces of 
native princes, where he had found the oddest mixture 
of oriental magnificence and modern American and 
European inventions. But here the products of the 
two civilizations had been, as it were, so coalesced 
that the result appeared almost homogeneous. An at¬ 
tempt had been successfully made to bring only those 
things into juxtaposition which would not suggest too 
glaring a contrast, and never in any instance was the 
ignorance betrayed which, in so many a wealthy na¬ 
tive household where European progress was affected, 
placed the cheapest fabrics of the Western world be¬ 
side the choicest masterpieces of the East. It was 
evident that a very intelligent mind, versed in the 
best refinements of occidental and oriental society, 
had presided with a rare selective skill. The end at¬ 
tained was one which only a cultivated Hindoo who 
had lived in Europe or America, or a cultivated Eu¬ 
ropean or American who had lived in India, could 
thoroughly appreciate. 

At the dinner, which almost immediately followed, 
and which was as near an approach to the conventional 
dinner of Marmaduke’s native soil as the difference 
in climate would permit, Sujeetra showed the same 
delicate tact that had thus far characterized his every 
word, with the exception that, seconding the liberat- 


THE UNSEEN HAND. 


3 33 


ing influence of some excellent wine, he made a more 
decided effort to induce Marmaduke to give rein to 
his tongue. He asked many questions about New 
York, showing that he was familiar with some of the 
leading traits of our social life, and his references to 
the books he had read concerning the United States 
demonstrated that he had been guided in his choice by 
either the happiest accident or the most careful train¬ 
ing. In replying to these questions Marmaduke was 
sometimes led to the brink of painful reminiscences, 
and the momentary hesitation of his manner appar¬ 
ently warned Sujeetra that this might be the case, 
for he instantly made some suggestion which proved 
he was no tyro in the art of diverting a dangerous 
conversational curve into a safe tangent at a moment’s 
notice. But still they ate their dinner alone, nobody 
besides the servants appeared, and Marmaduke kept 
marvelling who that one other person could be of 
whom Sujeetra had spoken, and who was so willing 
to serve him and offer him that consolation of which 
he stood in need. His curiosity was presently grati¬ 
fied. 

After dinner—neither of them smoked, and there¬ 
fore the cigar and the hookah were equally unat¬ 
tractive—Sujeetra said : 

“ I want to introduce you to my mother. She is 
something of an invalid, and takes only a light meal, 
alone, at the end of the day. She wants to meet you. 
We shall find her in one of the other rooms.” 

Leading the way, heconducted Marmaduke through 
a number of rooms, always on the same floor, until 
they came to one at which Sujeetra paused and 
knocked. A scarcely audible voice gave reply, and 


334 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


opening the door Sujeetra ushered his guest into a 
large, square apartment entirely of marble, where 
clusters of very slender pillars here and there con¬ 
cealed small tables whence colored and shaded lamps 
shed mild and harmoniously mingling lights. One 
side of the room, entirely unprotected, opened upon 
a terrace across which could be seen portions of the 
garden, now beginning to be gently illuminated by a 
full moon. As Marmaduke entered, a lady who had 
been reclining upon a couch at the side of the room 
furthest from him arose and came forward. Su¬ 
jeetra had scarcely concluded his few words of intro¬ 
duction ere the lady said, half to Sujeetra, it seemed, 
and half to Marmaduke : 

“Mr. Allan will find it hard to realize how glad I 
am to meet him—particularly as it is a pleasure he 
so seldom gives, even to his friends.” 

She gave him her hand, so soft and small that its 
texture awoke all sorts of imaginative and reminis¬ 
cent fancies in his peculiar sensuous and aesthetic 
nature. He glanced at her. The light was sufficient 
to reveal to him a woman of an age when women, 
however perfect may be the preservation of their 
beauty, are spoken of as old. She must have been 
sixty or thereabouts, though she did not look as far 
advanced as that. Moreover, she had neither that 
embonpoint nor that spareness which is apt to char¬ 
acterize the woman who has passed beyond the 
decades of maturity. Her figure had wonderfully 
retained its earlier proportions, and her face, though 
very sad, was marred by few of those lines and none 
of those wrinkles which so often make the faces of 
the old a tragic burlesque upon mortality. In the 


THE UNSEEN HAND. 


335 


full radiance of noon, some threads of gray might 
have been discerned amid the brown hair, which was 
brushed plainly back from the brow, according to 
the sedate fashion of former days, instead of being 
tortured into the coronal of stunted and aborted 
ringlets, as is now the mode. Her voice was one of 
the sweetest he had ever heard, and beneath the 
sweetness was that arresting and compelling charm 
which tells of a bitter yet chastening experience it is 
the lot of but few mortals to acquire—a charm very 
different from that which is simply due to elaborate 
training in the most winsome cadences of polite 
society. She motioned to a seat beside her, as she 
moved toward that part of the room opening upon 
the terrace. As he took it, Marmaduke glanced at 
the spot where he had left Sujeetra. The young 
man had vanished as if by magic. 

“My son Saja has told you,” she said, “how much 
I have desired to meet you, but he has not told you 
why. Mr. Allan,” and she paused, bestowing upon 
him a look of sympathetic interest and regard, “I am 
acquainted with the general tenor of your experience 
in Benares. I am perfectly acquainted with the ex¬ 
tent of your loss and the depth of your bereavement. 
And do not dream for a moment that I intend to 
underrate them, or that I do not entirely sympa¬ 
thize with them, when I add that there are sufferings 
even worse than that.” 

Her voice did not tremble, yet there was some¬ 
thing in it which suggested to her hearer that she 
was alluding to sufferings through which she herself 
had passed. The peculiar circumstances under which 
the interview had taken place, the interest which 


336 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


both she and her son had manifested in him, and 
which, as yet, was totally incomprehensible, the 
intimacy she professed to have with his Indian 
career, and the deep compassion that marked her 
reference to his sorrow, all produced a softening 
effect. At first he knew not what to say in reply. 
What he did say, at last, was somewhat stumbling in 
its utterance. 

“You are very kind to give me your sympathy. I 
am far from saying that there is no other affliction 
worse than mine. And yet it is quite possible that, 
though you may know much, you may not know all. 
In fact, I may go much further and say that it is 
quite impossible you should know all.” 

She did not answer immediately, but remained 
looking at him steadily for a moment, as if weighing 
all that might be implied by his words. Her whole 
manner indicated a woman who had seen much of 
the world, and who was prepared to take an ex¬ 
tremely liberal and intelligent view of moral and 
social questions with regard to which the eye of 
convention is purblind, if not hopelessly short¬ 
sighted. He had just been introduced to her, but 
her first words had served to establish between them 
almost the footing of an intimacy, and he was there¬ 
fore prepared for anything she might say that 
argued a better acquaintance with his movements 
than a few moments ago he would have deemed 
possible. 

“I do not, indeed, know,” she said at last, “what 
peculiar experiences you may have had prior to your 
arrival in this country. But this much I may say: 
that sad as your misfortunes have been here, they 


THE UNSEEN HAND. 


337 


might have been much worse had some one not 
taken a more than ordinary interest in your destiny. 
I happen to know,” she continued, with a gentle 
smile, as she saw Marmaduke glance at her wonder- 
ingly, ‘‘that you have been, so to speak, protected, 
from time to time, in a way and from a quarter of 
which you little dreamed.” 

There was an air of mystery about this which 
Marmaduke could not penetrate. He remembered 
that at intervals a semi-perception had come over 
him of some invisible potency having been exerted, 
whereby he had been saved from evils from which a 
stranger who had made himself so inimical to a 
mighty power like the Brahmins might have found 
it impossible to escape. He had wondered whether 
Zemindra, in spite of his words of rebuke and warn¬ 
ing, had not wielded some furtive influence. It was 
marvellous, indeed, that he and Adwe should have 
been permitted to live so long in absolute tranquil¬ 
lity. That respite of happiness could not be wholly 
accounted for by the supposition that it had been 
purposely granted by the Brahmins in order to lull 
suspicion. 

“I have been dreamily aware,” he responded, “of 
the sort of protection of which you speak. I have 
often asked myself whether it was really extended, 
or whether my sense of it was the product of my 
fancy.” 

“It was certainly extended,” said the lady, smiling. 
“ Make sure of that.” 

“And to whom am I indebted for such watchful 
guardianship ?” asked Marmaduke, half divining the 
truth. 


33» 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


“You are indebted to no one, since no obligation 
has been incurred. You remember what Hamlet 
says: ‘ The labor we delight in physics pain.’ It was 
a labor in which I took great delight.” 

“ You, madam ?” 

“I am that influence whose far-off effects you say 
you dimly recognized,” answered Sujeetra’s mother. 
“ One moment,” she continued, as she saw Marma- 
duke preparing to speak : “ I am a Rajah’s widow. 
Residing many years in this country, I have contrived 
to preserve the habits and the manners of freedom 
which American and European women enjoy in their 
native lands, but which are almost unknown, even in 
name, to the women of this country. My son, my 
only living child, happens to be one of the very few 
native Hindoos, of princely descent, who are thor¬ 
oughly imbued with European ideas. He is, in fact, 
Hindoo only in name. He has had a European 
education. He is thoroughly conversant with all 
those ideas of progress which nations like the United 
States and Great Britain, but more particularly the 
United States, advocate and keep in motion. From 
the time he was a boy he wanted to lead a life as 
different as possible from that of the typical Indian 
prince. On that account you see him voluntarily 
foregoing his wealth and rank, and serving in the 
capacity of secretary to Judge Enscoe. The name 
he bears, Sujeetra, is one of the disused titles of his 
^father. The deep interest he takes in municipal 
affairs and local politics—to say nothing of the poli¬ 
tics of the country—brought me in very close 
proximity to men like Judge Enscoe, and to others 
who, directly or indirectly, control in great measure 


THE UNSEEN HAND. 


339 


the well-being of Benares. The influence I had as 
the widow of a wealthy Rajah, who long ago made 
his peace with the British Government and grew to 
be considered one of its stanchest friends, I brought 
to bear upon your safety, for I assure you I had that 
at heart. I did what I could. The Brahmin priests 
are a mighty power in India, especially in Benares, 
the holy city. But I did what I could. For a long 
time your house was guarded and watched by the 
police, in order to shield you from attack, as the 
houses of strangers who have raised up such inveter¬ 
ate enemies as you have done have seldom been in 
all our local history. In an evil hour the vigilance 
was relaxed. But even when it was redoubled, after 
your frightful experience with the cobras, it was suc¬ 
cessfully defied by the devotees of the pagoda. I 
could not forsee every form their vengeance would 
take. I knew that you were about to flee. In fact it 
was I who requested my son to make to you that 
suggestion. Believe me, I would gladly have spared 
you what afterward happened. Scarcely any sacri¬ 
fice would have been too great.” 

Marmaduke listened, deeply interested, but also 
deeply mystified. With every sentence the motive 
which had actuated the lady grew more obscure. 

“ I thank you—I thank you!” he exclaimed. “ I am 
more grateful than words can easily tell. But I am 
lost in amazement—I do not understand. To what 
generous motive am I to attribute this exceeding 
kindness ?” 

She remained looking at him with a sort of wistful 
compassion, as though she hesitated to break a 
silence she had kept so long. But she evidently felt 



340 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


that the hour was come, for at last she said, in a 
voice just strong enough to wing its way through 
the heavy richness of the moonlight: 

“ Did you ever hear of Madam Gregory?” 

“ Madam Gregory?” 

He explored his memory in vain. No name like ' 
that answered his bidding. 

The lady sighed gently—such a sigh as one might 
give upon discovering that even the memory of his 
name has vanished from among those to whom he 
might have trusted its keeping. 

He heard her murmur something incoherent. 
Presently she asked : 

“ But de Bergerac. Surely you have heard of 
Madam de Bergerac ?” 

Again he fought his way back through the tangled 
thicket of early recollections. Slowly, with many an 
uncertain motion in the twilight of long-past years, 
it loomed into view. He looked up from this intent 
retrospection and said : 

“Madam de Bergerac? I seemed to have heard it 
ages ago. It certainly was never mentioned in my 
hearing since I was a child. But who she was— 
where she lived—” he ceased, and made that motion 
with his hand which is meant to dismiss a vague rem¬ 
iniscence that annoys one with its elusive indistinct¬ 
ness. 

“ I will assist you,” said his hostess, her voice now 
for the first time revealing emotion. “ Madam de 
Bergerac was an American by birth. Were she 
living now she would be my age. She was an only 
daughter and a spoiled child. She was considered a 
beauty. Her husband, who had emigrated to Amer- 


THE UNSEEN HAND. 


341 


ica, died when she was quite young and left her a 
fortune. She was eccentric by nature and had a 
passion for travel. For months at a time she dwelt 
in solitary places, like Lady Hester Stanhope in 
Eothen. She pretty nearly exhausted her husband’s 
fortune and married again—this time a Russian 
prince named Gregorovitch. The marriage was un¬ 
happy for both parties. He died, leaving her large 
possessions. She continued her travels as Madam 
Gregory, and in due time came to Hindoostan, where 
she visited all the principal cities, accompanied only 
by a Tartar maid.” 

The lady paused. A very perceptible tremor 
flowed and reflowed in her voice, as though the men¬ 
tion of these names stirred up a host of ghastly in¬ 
cidents before which memory quailed. 

“Do not continue,” said Marmaduke, “if it dis¬ 
tresses you. I willingly forego the curiosity I felt.” 

He did not yet see the bearing which the lady’s 
narrative had upon any explanation of the silent in¬ 
fluence she had exerted for his safety, but he was 
willing to believe that some latent connection might 
presently come to light. 

“ I must continue,” she resumed in tones which 
indicated great emotion held in great restraint. “ I 
shall have to speak very freely, but you will finally 
see why it is necessary to do so, for your fate is bound 
up with Madam Gregory’s fate in a way in which 
you cannot at present understand. Soon after she 
arrived at Cawnpore—that was in the spring of 1857 
—the Indian mutiny broke out. The whole world 
has shuddered at its horrors. Madam Gregory was 
in the midst of the worst.” 


342 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


Sitting close to him in the moonlight, while the 
vari-colored lamps shed their soft light on the marble 
floor, and the gentlest of breezes awoke in the gardens 
and rambled with cool touches over the terrace and 
between the slender pillars near which they sat, she 
related in a low voice the series of events at Cawn- 
pore with which the reader is already familiar. She 
paused only now and then to clasp her hands to her 
bosom and to draw a deep breath, until she came to 
the moment when the beautiful Lady of Cawnpore 
was left alone with the ferocious Prince Fazal in the 
palace of Bithoor. At that point she broke down, 
and leaning back on the sofa on which she sat, 
covered her face with her hands and remained silent 
for a few moments. She was not weeping. She 
was not even shuddering. She was merely living 
again through those agonizing moments which had 
changed the glorious supremacy of her once incom¬ 
parable beauty into slavery abject as that of the poor 
African woman snared in her native jungle. 

Marmaduke remained silent too. He saw that 
that was the subtlest, most intelligent sympathy he 
could give. As the narrative had proceeded, he had 
gradually perceived that the lady who was speaking 
to him was the unhappy Madam Gregory, and that 
the terms in which she had alluded to her as no 
longer living were a momentary fiction intended to 
bridge over delicately those passages in the narration 
which the sensitiveness of a woman so disastrously 
situated would be eager to avoid. In a few moments 
the lady, recovering herself, resumed the attitude of 
narrator, and continued as follows, a huskiness now 
and then varying her voice as she touched upon 


THE UNSEEN HAND. 


343 


events that troubled the most secret depths of out¬ 
raged memory. 

“ There is a time which I must pass over,” she said, 
casting aside the third person, in which she had hith¬ 
erto spoken, as though a formal statement had made 
it clear that she was actually the strangely-fated wo¬ 
man whose tortures she had been describing. “ Dur¬ 
ing that time I was as near to insanity as a human 
being can go without crossing the boundary. I 
should have killed myself, but the means were not at 
hand, and I was closely watched; and as the months 
passed by something occurred which constrained me 
to take a strange interest in living. It was the only 
thing that could possibly have happened that could 
have compelled me to take such an interest. I became 
the mother of a little boy so beautiful that every¬ 
thing lovely in my early life seemed to be peering 
at me out of his eyes whenever he looked at me. Ah, 
how I loved that child! Other children came. These 
bound me to life with indissoluble cords. Would I 
have been human had they not? Who was there to 
care for them as they ought to be cared for, except¬ 
ing me ? You will ask, naturally enough, why, when 
the Cawnpore massacre came to be avenged, when 
the mutiny was suppressed and peace and order were 
restored, I did not appeal to the British authorities 
and get safe return to my native land. There were 
two reasons for that at the time; and, as you will see, 
they were all-sufficient. One was that I had been re¬ 
moved to a remote part of the country abounding 
with jungles, whence escape was impossible, and to 
which access by English troops was difficult and haz¬ 
ardous. The other reason was that I went there 


344 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


bound to Prince Fazal by no- other tie but his caprice 
and his despotic will. I could not have endured the 
ignominy of this revelation. Afterwards, I will do 
him the justice to say, that he voluntarily made me 
his wife. After his fashion—the fashion of a pam¬ 
pered Indian prince who has been a despot gratified 
in every whim from his birth—he loved me, and the 
honor he considered he did me (and it was an honor 
measured by Hindoo rules), compensated, in his 
opinion, for any wrong he may have done me when I 
was conducted from the house of the massacre to the 
palace at Bithoor. But by the time I became his 
wife I was the mother of the enchanting child I have 
mentioned; and even had the way to my safe return 
to Europe or the United States been open without 
the shadow of a difficulty, I question whether I should 
have availed myself of it. I was bound to that exist¬ 
ence of gorgeous indolence by rivets, frail in seem¬ 
ing, but of gigantic strength, which I could not break. 
My children, girls and boys, grew up. I watched 
and guarded them through all the stages of child¬ 
hood and youth. One by one they died, all but one, 
Saja, the youngest, who reached manhood, to be the 
only happiness I was destined to know. Two years 
ago my husband died. He had vast wealth. He left 
me rich in my own right. For the third time I am 
the owner of a fortune. This estate is one of his nu¬ 
merous possessions. For years I have lived here. 
What became of the one which I once enjoyed as the 
widow of Prince Gregorovitch I do not know—I never 
made the least effort to discover. I was content to 
be believed dead—in Russia, in France, in England, 
in the United States, wherever I had lived. You will 


THE UNSEEN HAND. 


345 


understand now why, the first few months of my cap¬ 
tivity over, I made no efforts either to leave Hindoo- 
stan or to make public what had become of her who 
was known as the Lady of Cawnpore.” 

“ Perfectly ! perfectly !” exclaimed Marmaduke, 
who had listened with deep interest to her unhappy 
story. 

“ Madame Gregory was believed to have perished 
either in the encampment at Cawnpore, during the 
siege by Nana Sahib, or in the Bee-beegur, or House 
of the Ladies, where so many unfortunate women 
were cut down. I have myself read an account of her 
death in English and American papers more than 
once. But you are wondering what all this has to do 
with you and with the interest I take in you. I will 
tell you. Had I returned to the United States after 
your birth, as I intended, you might have married 
with impunity, in spite of your father’s unjust will. 
For I had enough wealth to have provided for you 
handsomely.” 

The concern with which Marmaduke had listened 
leaped at once into the wildest amazement. Who 
was this woman that she seemed familiar, not only 
with everything that had befallen him since his ar¬ 
rival in Benares, but who, having spent half of her 
lifetime in that distant land, was yet as familiar with 
the details of his father’s will as any of his intimate 
friends were, among whom he had spent his youth ? 
He had passed through so much that was strange 
and exciting that he was prepared, now, to imagine 
anything. This tendency was vastly increased by 
Madam Gregory’s next words. 

“ I omitted to mention that I had a son—not Saja, 


346 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE 


another son—of whom my first husband was the 
father. That father died a maniac.” 

Marmaduke slightly shivered. The words were 
not meant to be cruel, but they struck him in a most 
tender and sensitive spot. What did this reference 
to insanity mean ? Had the position been just the 
reverse of that unfolded by Dr. Billington ? Had 
Dr. Billington for some inexplicable reason made a 
mistatement? Was this woman his mother? And 
if so, where was the validity of his father’s will, which 
had endeavored to throw an insuperable obstacle in 
the way of his marriage ? 

“ I had a son,” repeated Madam Gregory,—for so, 
for the present, we must continue to call her,—“ but 
his existence would not have materially interfered 
with what would have been my intentions toward 
you. It may not be too late to speak of them here¬ 
after. Let us see what the future will bring forth. 
I am a subscriber to several English and American 
journals. They reach me regularly. I read, before 
you arrived here, of your resignation from the Church 
of St. Remigius and the breaking off of your engage¬ 
ment to Miss Orme. After your arrival I heard of 
you through the various public sources which ac¬ 
quaint society in Benares with the presence of any 
foreigner of conspicuousness and repute. I therefore 
had my eye upon you almost from the first, and after 
I saw the danger you had incurred I repeated to my 
son Saja, in confidence, all that I have told you here. 
Hence you immediately became to him a person of 
exceeding interest.” 

Marmaduke continued to listen, spellbound. Yes, 
the admiring and almost reverential glances which 


THE UNSEEN HAND. 


347 


Sujeetra had cast upon him were partially, but only 
partially, explained. But what was the origin of 
this profound regard ? 

“You now understand,” resumed Madam Gregory, 
“ how it is that I am acquainted with your manner 
of life since you took up your residence in Benares.” 

“ Yes, but I do not understand why you should 
have contemplated it with the slightest concern; why 
you should have done me the honor to single me out 
from the stream of travellers who pass through this 
province to or from their native lands ; and how it is 
that you are acquainted with the particulars of so 
strange a document as my father’s will.” 

“It can be explained in a dozen words. Your 
father had a twin-sister—that twin-sister is myself.” 




348 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


CHAPTER XXIV. 

AS A DREAM WHEN ONE AWAKETH. 

Marmaduke arose to his feet in astonishment. His 
father had a twin-sister ? This lady, Madam Greg¬ 
ory, of whom he had never heard, was his aunt ? 

“ Sit down,” she said, gently, taking one of his 
hands. “ Sit down and compose yourself, for I have 
to ask you some vital questions. You perceive that 
my close relationship to you gives me that right. 
The solicitude I have had for your welfare is now 
made clear. You may still ask why I did not make 
myself known before. It is easily answered. Had 
you never come here you would never, probably, have 
heard of me, at your present age, excepting by acci¬ 
dent. You probably did hear of your eccentric Aunt 
Josepha in your early childhood, and have forgotten 
all about it. Had I never seen your name mentioned 
in the newspapers—a circumstance brought about 
by your secession from the church—I should have 
taken for granted that, like most young men, you 
had acted in accordance with your father’s will and 
declined to marry, preferring to enjoy the fortune he 
left you. But when certain details of your life were 
brought vividly before me, as they were in the New 
York papers I read, and when, in addition, you came 
here and were in close proximity to me, then, although 
I had been Prince Fazal’s legal wife, and was now his 


AS A DREAM WHEN ONE AWAKETH. 


349 


widow, all my former feelings of degradation came 
over me, and I shrank for a time from meeting you 
and relating my singular and unfortunate history. 
Then came your own sufferings. They aroused my 
deepest sympathies. After the tragedy that has just 
darkened your life, I heard that you were living in 
despairing solitude—I saw that you needed compan¬ 
ionship and sympathy. I offer them to you, with my 
whole heart. Do you accept ?” 

She held out her hand, with that winning frank¬ 
ness which had made her a generation ago the 
delight of Cawnpore. Marmaduke took it and raised 
it to his lips. 

“Oh, aunt ! aunt!” was all he could exclaim. 

“ And now for the questions I have to ask. They 
strike deep and go to the root of your whole life. 
Why do I find my nephew, the only child of my only 
brother,—am I mistaken in supposing him to be the 
only child ?” 

“ No—no ! The only child.” 

“ Why do I find him—young, strong, and vigor¬ 
ous—leading an inactive life of pleasure here, instead 
of using his wealth to advantage, and making a mark 
upon the century, in his own country, which in so 
many respects leads the world ? I know nothing 
about Miss Orme; but I know it should not be possi¬ 
ble for the man who deserves to be my nephew to 
seriously purpose to marry a girl who is unworthy 
of him. It should be just as impossible for such 
a man to do that, as, once betrothed, to withdraw 
from the engagement simply because marriage 
would involve the forfeiture of his fortune. The 
whole thing is inexplicable to me, for I know enough 


35 ° 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


of you to be sure that, whatever your defects, you 
are a good young man. I can imagine that you 
might have withdrawn from your church because of 
a change in your religious belief. That demands no 
explanation, though doubtless you will give one. I 
can understand, even, that a young man, brought up 
amid wealth, can refrain from entering into any rela¬ 
tions that would involve marriage, when the legal 
conditions are such as those which surround you. 
But having once given his word, I cannot under¬ 
stand,—” 

“ Oh, stop! stop! in mercy’s name” exclaimed 
Marmaduke. “ The newspapers that you read gave 
you no information upon that point. How, then, 
were you justified in leaping to the conclusion that I 
was wholly to blame ?” 

“ The newspaper references did not throw light on 
the matter, but their wording was so obscure and 
veiled that the inference was that one of the parties 
to the betrothal was very greatly to blame. If it 
was not you, do you mean to say it was she ?” 

“ No, no ! Beatrice was entirely blameless.” 

“ Then it was you who withdrew ?” 

“ Yes.” 

“ Of your own free will ?” 

Of my own free will.” 

“ Then you only were to blame ?” 

“ I only was to blame.” 

“ She loved you ?” 

“ As deeply as I love her.” 

“ Then why did you withdraw ?” 

“ Oh, aunt ! Why do you torture me like this? 
You who know so much, must surely know all. It 


AS A DREAM WHEN ONE AWAKETH. 351 

is impossible you should not. Think of your own 
case.” 

“ My own case ?” 

“ You have a son you say—another son besides 
Sujeetra ?” 

“ I had one, yes—Roland de Bergerac. He is 
dead, thank heaven.” 

“ You thank heaven ? Why ?” 

“ Because, as I told you, his father died a maniac. 
Insanity had been in the family for generations. I 
did not know it when I married him. Roland was 
our only child. Had he lived he would in time have 
developed the family malady.” 

“ And you can say this calmly to me, looking me 
in the face, knowing, as you must know, that the 
same doom which hung over your son, my cousin, 
hangs this moment over me ?” 

“ Over you ! ” 

She pushed the couch back with a motion of her 
foot in the extremity of her amazement. 

“ My dear Marmaduke, what do you mean ?” she 
resumed. “ I perceive nothing insane about you ex¬ 
cepting this suspicion of insanity, and that is not 
generally regarded as a symptom—far from it. Your 
father was eccentric. So am I. If I had not been, I 
would not have spent so many of the best years of 
my life travelling in the by-paths of the world ac¬ 
companied only by a Tartar maid. I am eccentric. 
Your father was eccentricity itself, or he would not 
have made such a ridiculous and unjust will. His 
married life was not happy. Your mother and he did 
what millions of foolish young people have done 
before and since—married in haste and repented at 



35 2 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


leisure. He became a misanthrope, woman-hater, 
while still a young man. He was naturally a pessi¬ 
mist. He made up his mind that no son of his should 
ever marry. Hence his will, with the absurd condi¬ 
tions of which I was perfectly acquainted. But no 
one ever questioned his sanity or mine, or that of 
any member of our family.” 

“ But my mother—my mother ?” 

“ If your father had had as well-balanced a mind as 
hers, he would never have coupled your inheritance 
with such hampering qualifications. If she had lived 
she would have surely influenced him to change that 
iniquitous will. Nothing would have made her hap¬ 
pier than to live to be a grandmother, dandling your 
babies on her knee. If she had lived,—” 

“ How soon did she die ?” asked Marmaduke, his 
heart beating very violently. 

“ She died in my arms an hour after you were 
born.” 

And she was not insane ?” 

“ Not as much as I am at this moment, if you call 
that insanity. A more symmetrical intellect than 
your mother’s, in its kind and degree, has seldom 
existed. She belonged to a singularly healthy and 
long-lived race. Hence her death was a surprise. 
She was Spanish by birth. Her kinsmen did not wish 
her to marry your father, in spite of his wealth. 
They were of noble descent and wanted her to wed 
a man of rank. After her marriage to your father, 
intercourse between her and them ceased. Your 
parents were travelling in Russia, were staying at my 
house near St. Petersburg, when you were born. My 
second husband, the Prince Gregorovitch, had re- 


AS A DREAM WHEN ONE AWAKETH. 


353 


cently died. Years had passed since I had been in 
the United States. A Dr. Billington was travelling 
with them as family physician. I had known him in 
America. I had often consulted him on professional 
and business matters, and was glad to see him again. 
I had first met him in Philadelphia, where I lived for 
a time previous to my second marriage. He was 
with us at my Russian home through all that sad 
business. Your mother and I, though I had known 
her only a short time, were fondly attached to each 
other. Her last thoughts, her last words, were of 
you. After her death, your father, Dr. Billington, 
and a nurse that had been provided, went to New 
York. I set out on my travels, which terminated so 
disastrously at Cawnpore, leaving behind me, in 
some out-of-the-way place in my house near St. 
Petersburg, a will which, if ever discovered, will 
have provided comfortably for various persons who 
were once very kind to me during the interval be- 
between my first and second marriages. Heaven 
knows whether that will has ever been found and 
those poor people benefited. That is one of the 
many things that have troubled me in my exile. 
Arrived at Cawnpore, I lost sight of everybody I had 
ever known, lost sight of you as utterly as if you 
were dead, until I read about your resignation from 
the Church, and until I met you here to-night. In¬ 
sane ? Why my dear Marmaduke, who ever could 
have put such an ‘ insane ’ notion as that into your 
head ?” 

The wild thoughts that had been galloping through 
Marmaduke’s brain during the last few moments 
seemed to have got into his blood, so furiously did it 



354 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


dart through his veins and beat in his temples. 
Amazement, exultation, delight, a frenzy of indigna¬ 
tion, the passion for revenge, a sickening fear lest 
this revelation should now be just too late, combined 
to paralyze his tongue for a moment, until, at last, 
he finally stammered forth one name : 

“ Dr. Billington.” 

“ Dr. Billington !” 

It was Madam Gregory’s turn to be astonished 
now. 

“ Dr. Billington !” she repeated, as if the mere re¬ 
capitulation of the name could dispel the mystery. 
“ Why Dr. Billington was there from first to last. 
He saw your mother die. He knew, as well as I, the 
entire integrity of her intellect. Dr. Billington ! He 
told you this ? He is an arch liar—a consummate 
imposter. What could have been his motive ?” 

Marmaduke was pacing up and down, holding his 
hands to his head. 

“ Ah ! villain ! coward ! traitor !” he exclaimed. 
“ His son is engaged to Beatrice. They are to be 
married before the middle of next month,” and he 
hastily told Madam Gregory about the paper he 
had received that day. Then he narrated, as rapidly 
as he could form the words, the substance of his in¬ 
terview with the doctor, and his subsequent interview 
with Beatrice. When he came to that part of it 
where Beatrice had fainted at the intelligence that 
he withdrew from the engagement under the plea 
that he could not face poverty, his voice, which had 
been animated by -the vengeance and indignation 
that thrilled through him from head to foot, trembled, 


AS A DREAM WHEN ONE AWAKETH. 


355 


and became lost amid the struggles he made for self- 
command. 

“ My darling boy ! My noble Marmaduke !” ex¬ 
claimed his aunt. “ How you have suffered !” 

He was now kneeling beside her, amid the impas¬ 
sioned unconsciousness of his narration. She put 
one arm around his neck, drew him to her, and kissed 
his forehead with a mother’s tenderness. They min¬ 
gled tears in silence for a moment, over the horrible 
destruction of so much innocent happiness. There 
had been an awful tragedy in both their lives. Then 
a sterner feeling returned to animate them. 

“ And this letter,” said Madam Gregory, as Mar¬ 
maduke resumed his seat beside her. “ This letter 
purporting to be written by your father, regarding 
his wife’s insanity—you have not got it about you?” 

“ I have it at my house, in Benares, under lock and 
key. I will bring it here to-morrow.” 

“ Do so. Or I will go there.” 

“ How can it be accounted for ? Is it a forgery ? 
He would not dare !” 

“ No, he would not dare ! The letter is not a for¬ 
gery. I wrote it.” 

“ You !” 

“ I wrote it soon after the death of my first hus¬ 
band. It related to my son Roland, who, as I in¬ 
formed you, I had every reason to suppose would 
inherit insanity. I borrowed a hint in advance from 
your father, in regard to the will he had often said 
he would draw up w T ere he to marry and have a son. 
Only I had perfectly good reason for what I did. 
Your father had none, beyond the suggestions of 
misanthropy. That part of my will which, as the 





356 THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 

widow of M. de Bergerac, I drew up in favor of my 
son, made precisely the same conditions with respect 
to his possible marriage that your father’s did with 
respect to yours. M. de Bergerac’s property was in 
America. To make assurance doubly sure, I placed 
in Dr. Billington’s hand the note which he subse¬ 
quently palmed off upon you as your father’s.” 

“ But the handwriting?” 

“ Have you never heard that twins, even when they 
are brother and sister, often have strange resem¬ 
blances in many habits and customs? So in hand¬ 
writing, which is mainly a habit after all. Our hand¬ 
writing was almost identical, even to the signature. 
My name was Josepha. Your father’s was Joseph. 
After my first husband’s death, every association con¬ 
nected with him was so painful that I resumed my 
maiden name. Hence my signature to the note the 
doctor showed you was ‘ Josepha Allan.’ If you had 
that letter about you now, you would see that my 
signature was very like your father’s. He used to 
give a little twist to the end of the ‘ h ’ in ‘ Joseph,' 
which had a close resemblance to the‘a’ in ‘Jos¬ 
epha.’ And tell me, was not the date on that letter 
somewhat obscure,—we were both of us bad at fig¬ 
ures,—and was the letter not disfigured by a blot? 
Neither of us could write a letter without a blot.” 

Marmaduke could not be certain about the date, 
but he remembered the blot. 

“ You will find, on examination,” said his aunt, 
“ that the presence of the blot, and the distorted 
manner in which the letters were formed, made it 
possible for Dr. Billington to practice this deception. 


AS A DREAM WHEN ONE AWAKETH. 


357 


But why do you take my hand ? You are not go¬ 
ing ?" 

“ I must examine the letter this very night. I must 
see, with my own eyes, whereabouts in the letter the 
opportunity for deception occurred. And then, aunt, 
you forget. Something must have been going on of 
which I was not cognizant, that spurred the scoun¬ 
drel on to this imposture. George Billington, his 
son, must have secretly loved Beatrice. His father, 
to whom he is the apple of the eye, must have re¬ 
solved to secure her for George, and used this in¬ 
famous means. You forget they are to be married 
on the 13th of March. I shall just have time to reach 
there, if I start instantly. To-night is Tuesday. I 
cannot leave Bombay before Friday, February the 
10th. The weekly steamer sails then for Brindisi. It 
will reach Brindisi in fifteen days. I can get to Liv¬ 
erpool from Brindisi in two days and a half, and 
thence to New York just in time—thank God ! Just 
in time !” 

There was fire in his voice and in his eye. Delight 
and triumph, and the ecstasy of hope, were shining 
on his face. They transfigured him. He was thank¬ 
ing God, the first time he had done so since leaving 
the little church of St. Remigius. This instinctive 
gratitude, the impulse of the soul toward the Creator, 
restored to him all his beauty, strength, and youth. 

“ Oh, Marmaduke!” She laid a gentle, pitying 
touch upon his arm : “ I would not say anything to 
dishearten you. But you have not taken delay or 
accident into account. If you should arrive a day— 
an hour too late.” 

“ It is for that reason I am leaving you now. I 







353 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


shall telegraph to Beatrice the moment I reach 
Benares to wait for me, for I am coming. I am going 
to return to my house only to get my letter to con¬ 
front that scoundrel with it. It is the only proof of 
his infamy I have.” 

“ You are wrong. You have another proof.” 

“ Another?” 

“ Myself.” 

“ But you will not go to New York ?” 

“ I will—for your sake ! The Lady of Cawnpore 
was dead and is alive again; and was lost and is 
found.” 


“ DIVYAVAPOUR GATWA.’ 


359 


CHAPTER XXV. 

“ DIVYAVAPOUR GATWA.” 

When a woman is wholly devoted to a man, be she 
mother, wife, sister, sweetheart, or friend, there is 
nothing- she will be likely to omit to do for him—ex¬ 
cept to prepare herself at short notice, for a long jour¬ 
ney, without superfluous baggage. Madam Gregory 
proved that in this respect she was an exception to her 
sex, for it was through no waiting occasioned by her 
that Marmaduke underwent the slightest delay in 
reaching Bombay in time to catch Friday’s steamer. 

At the close of their interview Madam Gregory 
had called Saja (who, of course, had left his mother 
and Marmaduke alone by pre-arrangement), and 
briefly explained the situation of affairs and an¬ 
nounced her intention to sail with Marmaduke on 
Friday. There was no reason for her any longer 
harboring her former shyness with respect to return¬ 
ing to her native land and people, inasmuch as, known 
to the country of her adoption as the lawful Princess 
Sujeetra (or Princess Fazal, as she was sometimes 
called), she enjoyed the esteem and affection of every¬ 
body there who knew her. It was under the name 
of Madam Gregor}'-, however, that she preferred to 
re-enter New York, and we shall therefore continue 
to speak of her under that title until she vanishes 
from this record forever. Saja welcomed Marma- 





3 6 ° 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


duke warmly as his cousin, and Marmaduke no longer 
felt any inclination to resent the kindly look that 
beamed from his Indian kinsman’s brilliant eyes. 

The so.ul of the young American was now in an 
uproar of excited and hilarious feeling, such as he 
had never known in all his life before. Even the fury 
of his indignation against the infamy of Dr. Billing- 
ton—an infamy in which he did not as yet know that 
George had had no participation—was, for the time, 
completely lost sight of in the triumphant joy that 
blew through his spirit like an intoxicating breeze, 
until every pore of his being welcomed pleasure as its 
guest. The reaction was so great, the relief from the 
pressure of dreaded insanity so immense, that there 
were long intervals during which he did not trust 
himself to speak, as Sujeetra drove him back toward 
midnight along the still, moonlit road. These feel¬ 
ings must not be thought unnatural in view of the 
deep sorrow through which he had recently passed. 
The advent of Adwe had happened in such a manner, 
and under such circumstances, that the only consola¬ 
tion and compensation left for him on earth was to 
respond to the love that was the final form in which 
her exuberant gratitude clothed itself. What would 
have beep cold sin and selfish indulgence under less 
extenuating conditions, became, even in the eye of 
retrospection, a venial weakness when every factor of 
his environment, eyery element of his pre-experience, 
was taken into consideration. In the tumult of the 
moment she mipgle4 gonfp.sedly arpid all the pictures 
of the future which came thropging before him at the 
bidding of hope. He rejoiced that the glad resigna¬ 
tion of the Christian faith had been accorded her in 


“divyavapour gatwa." 


361 


her dying moments ; but it argued no infidelity to 
her memory, no flippant forgetfulness of her spiritual 
beauty, which so far outweighed the loveliness of her 
body, that his thoughts were now concentrated upon 
Beatrice and the happiness which should yet be his 
and hers. 

It had been arranged that Sujeetra should remain 
at his palace all night, that Madam Gregory should 
join them there next day at noon, and that thereupon 
she and Marmaduke should immediately depart for 
Bombay to catch the steamer. That Madam Greg¬ 
ory was mentally no ordinary woman was sufficiently 
proven by the simple fact that, after so many years 
of seclusion, she at once, a sufficient motive being fur¬ 
nished, undertook a journey to the antipodes with 
less time to prepare than most women would require 
in making ready for a trip from New York to Chicago. 

In the wild buoyancy of the hour, it was Marraa- 
duke’s first impulse to drive at once to the nearest 
office and telegraph to Beatrice, announcing his in¬ 
stant return, and so wording the rest of his message 
that her intended nuptials would certainly be post¬ 
poned should he by any chance not arrive in New 
York until after the date he had seen specified. He 
had nothing, of course, but the newspaper paragraph 
to depend upon, and he took for granted that it was 
substantially correct. He argued that the person 
who sent it, whoever he or she might be, believed in 
its accuracy, and he knew that, making all necessary 
deductions for the errors in newspaper gossip, it was 
just as likely to be true as not, if there were any truth 
in the rumor at all. After his first flame of exultation 
had burnt itself out, there came a harrowing fear lest 







3 62 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


the paragraph might be more than true, and lest a 
misprint had made the announced date of marriage 
figure as the 13th instead of the 3d. On reflection, too, 
he saw the impossibility of telegraphing that night— 
it would then be noon in New York—or perhaps of 
telegraphing at all. At that hour, in the ancient city 
of Benares, the offices would all be closed ; but even 
were they open, he did not know where to address his 
message. He knew, of course, where the residence 
of the Mincers had been; but nearly twenty months 
had passed since then, and the fluctuations of New 
York life among the impecunious did not allow him 
to suppose they occupied their old quarters. The 
only mutual acquaintances of Mrs. Orme, Beatrice, 
and himself, who knew that former address, were Dr. 
Billington and George ; and of course they were 
not to be thought of at such a crisis. Where, then, 
should he send his message, even after it had been 
prepared, and what were the words in which it would 
be expedient to couch it ? 

Filled with these thoughts, Marmaduke reached 
home. After seeing Sujeetra comfortably bestowed, 
and bidding him good-night, he repaired swiftly to 
his own room and unlocked the cabinet that con¬ 
tained the fatal letter. It was yellow with age when 
he had first received it, and it was dilapidated now 
from frequent handling. He spread it open smoothly 
before him, under a strong light, and again read and 
examined it attentively. The accidents which had 
assisted Dr. Billington in his deception were now 
perfectly obvious, in the light of Madam Gregory’s 
explanation. Marmaduke first observed the date. 
The year, which he had naturally taken for 1857, 


DIVYAVAPOUR GATWA,” 


363 


would bear construing into 1851, for which, of course, 
it had been meant. The blot he had noticed when 
the doctor first placed it in his hands, and to which 
he had ascribed no importance, he now perceived 
was sufficiently large to alter the signification of one 
important word and thus give the game into Dr. 
Billington’s hands, if it were once granted that the 
signature was Marmaduke’s father’s. In that signa¬ 
ture Marmaduke took note of that deceiving simili¬ 
tude which rendered it so easily mistakable for his 
aunt’s. The curl in the Christian name’s concluding 
“h” might easily be conjured into an “a.” The 
blot fell upon the first letter of the word “father,” 
entirely obscuring the “ f,” which must have been 
disproportionately small, and allowing “father” to 
be taken for “ mother” by any eye that had been pre¬ 
viously beguiled into accepting the delusion. Coin¬ 
cidence had conspired with Dr. Billington’s exceeding 
cleverness. He, too, must have read of Madam 
Gregory’s death and firmly believed in it. From 
this point of view, the fraud lost some of its audacity 
though none of its atrocity. The reader who will 
reperuse the note, as transcribed in chapter fifth, 
will see how, with these accidents in his favor, the 
doctor could readily have practised the deception 
whereby he made Marmaduke believe himself the 
victim of inherited insanity. 

Marmaduke folded the letter and placed it in his 
pocket-book, in order that it might never leave him 
until the hour for using it had arrived. Then, feel¬ 
ing still unable to sleep, he pondered upon the mes¬ 
sage he should telegraph to Beatrice, and finally 



3 6 4 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


settled upon the following as being the most em¬ 
phatic, comprehensive, and clear: 

“ I beg you to postpone until after March 13. I 
leave Bombay February 10th, and shall be in New 
York by or before then. In consequence of a great 
wrong perpetrated, there has been great misappre¬ 
hension. All can be explained. I am without blame. 
Tell Dr. Billington Madam Gregory comes with 
me.” 

He thought that sufficiently cogent, since it cov¬ 
ered the ground, and all its allusions would certainly 
be understood. In order that no means of communi¬ 
cating with her at the earliest moment might be left 
untried, he resolved to send three despatches,'em¬ 
bodying these words, to the care of three persons— 
Mrs. Mincer, the present rector of St. Remigius, and 
his man of business in New York, who had had 
charge of his affairs ever since his residence in India. 
To each of these he would send a personal despatch, 
requesting him or her to ascertain Miss Orme’s ad¬ 
dress, and to lose no time in seeing that she received 
the telegram. It would scarcely be likely that, 
among all three, none of the messages would be de¬ 
livered ; and if they all were, it would only serve to 
show the intensity of his feelings and the urgency of 
the situation. 

These preliminaries settled, he at last went to bed. 
But so exhausting a day had left his brain in an ex¬ 
cited state, and after he was asleep dreams chased 
each other in quick succession, and turned his repose 
to weariness. One of them brought Adwe again 
before him, in delicious dimness, as she danced be¬ 
hind the pink screen of translucent marble, clasping 


“divyavapour gatwa.” 


365 


a crucifix to her bosom, and wearing, instead of her 
radiant smile, a pensive, pleading look. Suddenly 
her dance, which seemed like a delicious incantation 
to pleasure, turned into a stately minuet, and the 
crucifix into a cobra, as she gave her hand to Dr. 
Billington, and met as her nearest partners George 
and Beatrice. Then the scene suddenly changed 
into a church—the Church of St. Remigius—with 
Beatrice and George at the altar. The clergyman, 
in his grotesque hideousness, bore a frightful resem¬ 
blance to the fakir of Tranquebar, and was pro¬ 
nouncing the words which made them man and wife. 
He tried to get near them ere the last irrevocable 
sentence was uttered, but could not move a muscle. 
He tried to call, to attract Beatrice’s attention, but 
could not emit a sound. He was just about to break 
out of his paralyzed state, when a detaining grip was 
laid upon his shoulder, and as the clergyman con¬ 
cluded, he found himself in the grasp of Zemindra, 
who, in the voice of an incarnate retribution, ex¬ 
claimed, with Tennysonian accents : 

“Too late ! too late ! you cannot enter now.” 

He awoke with a groan. Did this dream, in its 
disastrous conclusion, presage, amid all its fantastic 
accompaniments, the denouement that awaited him in 
that bustling emporium of the West toward which he 
should so soon be hastening? When he fell asleep it 
was only again to dream and toss. He awoke at 
sunrise, unrefreshed, and at the first moment that 
business began in Benares hastened to the nearest 
telegraph office. Here a great disappointment 
awaited him. The clerk was there, but an accident 
had happened to the wires between Benares and 




366 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


Bombay, and communication was cut off from the 
latter city for the present. It would be necessary for 
him to delay sending his messages until he should 
reach Bombay, which would be next day. Fretting 
underneath this vexation,—though his reason in¬ 
formed him that if the marriage did not take place 
until the 13th of next month there would be plenty 
of time to implore its postponement, even after 
reaching Liverpool, which he calculated would be on 
the 28th of February,—he called on Mr. Loveridge, 
and relieved himself by giving him a brief summary 
of all he had endured and suffered from the last 
interview with Dr. Billington and Beatrice, up to his 
first interview with his aunt the previous night. The 
good man listened with the affectionate interest of a 
father, and with a burning indignation which showed 
that he retained enough of the old Adam to prove 
dangerous to the wicked doctor should the punish¬ 
ment of that accomplished leech be confided to him. 
He accompanied Marmaduke to the palace, where he 
was introduced to Sujeetra ; and while the three sat 
at breakfast together, gladly accepted various re¬ 
sponsibilities which Marmaduke’s immediate depart¬ 
ure rendered it necessary to apportion between him 
and Madam Gregory’s son. The yacht had proved 
a superfluous purchase, of which Marmaduke could 
not get rid. At present it must remain at the port of 
Benares, just as the palace must remain upon his 
hands until its rental from its princely owner had 
expired. Fortunately Marmaduke’s wealth was suffi¬ 
cient to allow of these losses without his feeling 
them very deeply. But as he sat breakfasting with 
his friends, he reflected with a thrill of exultation 


DIVYAVAPOUR GATWA.” 


367 


that that wealth was soon to become a thing of the 
past, and that poverty, shared with Beatrice, was to 
be his happy portion. Poor Marmaduke! He did 
not know that, of his three messages, one would 
never be handed to Beatrice by the person to whom 
it was addressed ; and that the other two would not 
come to hand until after they could accomplish the 
purpose for which they were designed. He did not 
know that his man of business had died a week ago, 
and that a letter was now on its way informing him 
of that fact. Nor did he know that the present 
rector of St. Remigius—an old bachelor who lived 
alone—had gone on a tour for his health; that Mrs. 
Orme and Beatrice no longer attended that sanctu¬ 
ary ; or that Mr. and Mrs. Mincer, in consequence of 
changes of which we may presently hear more, had 
quitted the neighborhood wherein they had resided 
for so many years. Marmaduke felt exultant and 
hopeful, trusting implicitly to two very desirable 
events. The first was that one of the three messages 
would reach Beatrice in a day or two, in ample time 
to stop all arrangements for the impending marriage. 
The second was that he himself would arrive in her 
presence before that date. He would reach Liver¬ 
pool Tuesday, February 28th. He could sail the next 
day for New York. According to his calculation, 
that would give him twelve days upon the ocean, 
allowing for accidental delays ; and even should the 
voyage take so long, he still might fall at her feet 
twenty-four hours before the marriage service. In 
reality he had a day longer, for he had forgotten that 
it was leap-year, and that February, therefore, had 
twenty-nine days. In the glow of the moment and 





3 68 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


the haste of preparation, he felt a degree of assurance 
that made his eyes glitter and his heart beat with 
exquisite throbs. 

Madam Gregory was true to her promise. She 
reached the palace by noon, with much less than the 
luggage which might have been expected of a lady 
who had led a life of luxury and who was going to 
take, at little more than an hour’s notice, a journey 
occupying a month. It is probable that nothing but 
the urgency of the occasion would have aroused her 
to this ; for though it may be said, arid truly said, 
that her presence in New York would not be indis¬ 
pensable, yet she saw that her appearance there, in 
the nick of time, would of itself be a shock that would 
paralyze Dr. Billington in the midst of his guilty 
triumph; and she w r as awake to the imperative 
necessity of arriving on time. Now that she had 
made up her mind to go, the fever-travel of her young 
days seemed to have returned upon her, and the only 
thing that awoke solicitude was the necessity of 
leaving her adored son, Saja, behind. She solaced 
herself by the consideration that he would be of great 
assistance to Mr. Loveridge in looking after Marma- 
duke's interests. Saja would have gone with them 
as far as Bombay, if possible, but business entangle¬ 
ments made such loss of time very inexpedient, and 
mother and son parted with a philosophical seeming, 
which told nothing of the deep anxiety and affection 
beneath the surface. They exchanged their last 
adieux at the station in Benares. 

Ere the party left the palace, and while the last 
arrangements were being made (Marmaduke had 
already written notes of farewell to the Rajah Suraj 


“ DIVYAVAPOUR GATWA." 


369 


Singh, and others of his friends, including the presi¬ 
dent of the Brahmo Somaj), Mr. Loveridge drew 
Marmaduke aside into a small adjoining room, 
where they could be quite alone. Marmaduke, 
anticipating what Mr. Loveridge desired to say to 
him, took him by the hand, and, in recognition of 
the kindly charity the old man had always shown 
him, said : 

“ During all the months that I have been here, you, 
a minister of the Christian religion, whose life has 
been angelic in its purity and devotion, have never 
uttered to me one rebuke. Why ?” 

Mr. Loveridge gazed at him for a moment with the 
tender pity with which a saint might gaze on the sin 
and folly of fallen man. 

“ If I were without sin,” he answered, “ I might be 
tempted to cast a stone. If you have committed 
error, you have been prodigiously tried. You have, 
at least, shown another how to reach the heaven upon 
which you turned your back. I can only say, ‘ Go 
and sin no more.’ ” 

He gently withdrew his fingers from Marmaduke’s 
cordial grasp, and placing both hands upon Marma¬ 
duke’s head, who bowed it reverently before him, 
repeated softly : 

“ The Lord bless thee and keep thee ; the Lord 
make His face shine upon thee and be gracious unto 
thee ; the Lord lift up His countenance upon thee, 
and give thee peace.” 

As he raised his head again, Marmaduke looked at 
him with moistened eyes and choking throat. Mr. 
Loveridge’s face was shining with a beautiful inward 





370 THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 

light, too sweet in its benignancy to need the veil 
that Moses wore on descending from the mount. 


I 

Madam Gregory and her nephew arrived at Bom¬ 
bay at an hour next day sufficiently early to enable 
him to secure berths, and to visit and inspect the 
ship that was to sail for Brindisi on the morrow. 
He then went to the telegraph office and arranged 
for the transmission of his messages. Madam 
Gregory, accompanied by her maid, a native servant 
greatly attached to her, and who had needed no 
great inducement to accompany her, went immedi¬ 
ately on board the vessel, which was to sail at an 
early hour next morning, and took possession of her 
state-room. But Marmaduke was in too perturbed a 
condition to admit of such repose. After assuring 
himself of the hour of setting sail, he left the ship 
and wandered through the city. All the events of 
the last two years, and especially of the last year and 
a half, reduplicated themselves in his memory, 
acquiring those disproportioned relations, and those 
fantastic obliquities and accessions, that are apt to 
accompany such recollections under exciting in¬ 
fluences. Lost in these musings, he suddenly realized 
that he had roamed beyond the suburbs of the city ; 
and he was about to retrace his steps through the 
moonlit darkness into which he had plunged, when 
he was attracted by what looked like some bonfires 
at a little distance. Advancing toward them, he saw 
four large fires, in full blast, burning at the four 
equidistant points. Between them, from time to 
time, moved several nude figures, Brahmin priests 


“ DIVYAVAPOUR GATWA.” 


371 


who had stopped there while performing their pil¬ 
grimage, and were now busy at their evocations. ( 
He knew that it was the practice with a certain 
order of priests to subject themselves to penances 
and rigid mortifications, in order that after death 
they might at once attain the highest re-incarnation 
in superior spheres. As he turned away, his curi¬ 
osity satisfied, he caught sight of an aged and 
decrepit man, entirely nude, sitting, bowed and cross- 
legged, upon the ground, at a central point between 
the four fires. Inquiring, he was told that the 
devotee, known as the Phantom, sat thus night and 
day, the fires meanwhile being constantly fed, so as 
to burn without interruption. Something in the 
spare outlines of this crouching figure, which seemed 
nigh unto death, fastened Marmaduke’s attention. 
Striding through the prostrating heat, he went close 
to the fanatic, who, reduced to the last degree of 
emaciation, appeared to have scarcely strength 
enough to lift his head. He did so, however, and 
fixed upon Marmaduke his glazing eyes, just as the 
young man identified the deep red scar which ran 
across the skull and recognized Dalpatram-Omi, son 
of Narajara-Omi, fakir of Tranquebar. 

The torpor had deepened in those terrible eyes, and 
all the latent malignancy seemed to have died out of 
them forever. The slightest gleam irradiated them 
for a moment, as he recognized Marmaduke, and 
murmured in an exultant voice, just audible: 

“ Divyavapour gatwa.” 

Marmaduke caught the words. They were in San¬ 
scrit, with which he was sufficiently familiar to know 




372 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


that they meant, “ I have clothed myself with a fluidic 
body.” 

“ Divyavapour gatwa,” murmured the fakir again, 
his head falling heavily upon his breast. 

Marmaduke stalked rapidly away. All that was 
horrible in Hindoostan seemed to rush through him, 
to make him a companion phantom to the expiring 
fakir. 

An hour after the vessel left port, Marmaduke 
entered his stateroom in order to make some slight 
change in his toilette. To his astonishment he found 
a note, addressed to him, pinned to the pillow-case in 
his berth. The singularity of the circumstance struck 
him instantly, but without pausing to study the 
address, as so many persons inanely do at such a 
juncture, he tore open the missive and read the fol¬ 
lowing : 

“ A last farewell. But remember that no transitory 
pleasure you can experience, in the fulfilment of 
your dearest hopes, can prevent the law of Karma 
from reaching you, in this incarnation or the next. 
How truly one of your hymns says, though with a 
narrow glimpse of the vastness of the application, 

‘ ’Tis not the whole of life to live, 

Nor all of death to die.’ 

In other words, the career of each mortal is made up 
of many lives and many deaths. Yet all are one life, 
and it is our duty to make that one life as perfect as 
may be. Halkar Zemindra.” 

Marmaduke tore the note up in vague displeasure. 
He could not bear to have a dark shadow from this 
presageful spirit thrown upon his joyful unrest. His 
curiosity was aroused, however, as to the means by 


“ DIVYAVAPOUR GATWA, 


3 73 


wmcn Zemindra had gained knowledge of his de¬ 
parture, and the manner in which the note had found 
its lodgment. He questioned all who were likely to 
give him information on this last point, but could 
find none who had witnessed, the arrival or departure 
of anybody that had entered his cabin, or had visibly 
taken thither a note. After some useless conjecture, 
he tried to dismiss all recollection of the hazy fore¬ 
boding it contained, and as he ascended to the deck 
he would have become gay and buoyant, had not a 
sudden blackness in the atmosphere announced the 
coming of a storm so violent as not to be regarded 
with indifference by even the captain himself. 



374 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


CHAPTER XXVI. 

HOPES AND FEARS. 

At sight of the coming storm (unusual at that sea¬ 
son), Marmaduke, who had hitherto been sustained 
by the wildest hope, began to be disturbed by one of 
those numerous trepidations which were now to be his 
lot until he should reach New York—to say nothing 
of what might happen there. As we have already 
said, he had calculated that he should reach Brin¬ 
disi on the 25th and Liverpool on the 28th, just in 
time to take the steamer which left there next day, 
February 29th. These dates, making allowance for 
nearly every accident, except wreckage, likely to hap¬ 
pen, would land him in New York ere the 13th of 
March. But this calculation was destined not to be 
fulfilled. The storm that was arising presently burst 
upon the pathway of the vessel with full fury, and 
though it was not sufficient to inspire with terror a 
crew and captain who had weathered many tempests, 
it was not only, with its frightful lightning-flashes 
and thunder-rolls, appalling to those unused to such 
tropic outbreaks, but it greatly delayed the ship on 
her course. It was the introduction to others which 
occurred during the first four days, so that, when 
what proved to be the last gale was over, it was abso¬ 
lutely certain that Brindisi would not be reached 
before the 26th, and probably not until later. If on 


HOPES AND FEARS. 


375 


the 26th, it would still be possible to catch the 
steamer. The time from Brindisi to Liverpool might 
luckily enable them to reach the port of the latter 
city ere it was too late. To be sure, Marmaduke 
still relied to some extent upon the potency of his 
telegrams to Beatrice, however long he might be de¬ 
tained by possible contingencies ; but he could not 
be absolutely certain that either of those telegrams 
would reach her ; neither could he be sure, without 
the shadow of a doubt, that the statement they con¬ 
tained would over-balance the impression created by 
his behavior during his last interview with her. It 
was considerations like these that drove him from 
his former position of joyous security, and com¬ 
pressed the misery of suspense into every hour, now 
that he saw the impossibility of reaching Brindisi on 
the date at first set. 

Madam Gregory shared these trepidations. She 
had passed through so much abject fear and 
agony, that she appreciated every form of mental 
suffering. Her mere presence was a help and a sup¬ 
port to Marmaduke. Had he been alone, his alter¬ 
nations between despair and hope would have been 
incalculably harder to endure. 

The captain was one of those ambitious and punc¬ 
tilious sailors who are never satisfied unless the port 
is made on time. As though his personal i-eputation 
were at stake, he strained every nerve, and crowded 
on all the steam, with the intention of reaching Brin¬ 
disi on the 25th. But he was doomed to failure 
from the first. They did not enter that ancient har¬ 
bor until the evening of the 26th, and could not take 
the cars for Calais until next morning. The change 



376 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


from hope to fear, and from fear to hope again, which 
now came over Marmaduke, kept his nerves con¬ 
stantly on the strain. Whatever pleasure might 
have been derived from such a journey under ordi¬ 
nary circumstances, became quite impossible, and 
his mind w T as almost wholly occupied in calculating 
time and distance, consulting guide-books, weighing 
averages and possibilities, and going over and over 
again through all the arithmetic of railway and 
ocean travel. To reach Wednesday’s steamer was 
still within the limit of things that might be. The 
train from Brindisi made fair progress. The coun¬ 
tries they traversed flashed by them with a speed to 
which Marmaduke would gladly have given greater 
impetus. He reached Calais in time for the steamer 
awaiting them, and met with no more than the ordi- 
nary good and ill luck in crossing the narrow space 
which separated them from Dover. When the train 
which was to conduct them to Liverpool was once 
fairly going, the two travellers felt much nearer their 
destination than they really were. For, after their 
long journey from Benares, the crossing of the ocean 
seemed a mere bagatelle ; whereas, in the delays that 
were experienced, and in the anxiety that was en¬ 
dured, it proved more torturing than any cause for 
solicitude that had yet arisen. 

When the train came thundering into Liverpool, 
amid the noise and crash which make the engine 
resemble an animate monster dragging scores of 
captives in his clutch, neither of our travellers 
thought for a moment of going to a hotel. They 
gave orders to have their luggage transferred at once 


HOPES AND FEARS. 


3 77 


to the steamer, and then learned, for the first time, 
that the good ship had left three hours before. 
Marmaduke turned aside to vent the exclamation of 
fury and hopelessness that rose to his lips. Nothing 
could be done except to remain until Saturday. 
Three days lost! Three days wasted in heart-sick 
idleness and expectancy, when every moment ought 
to be wafting him toward New York ! And what 
assurance could he have, at that season of the year, 
that the voyage could certainly be accomplished in 
the nine days that would then remain ? In order 
certainly to make his presence in New York on the 
13th effectual (unless, indeed, Beatrice gave heed to 
the telegram which Marmaduke hoped—vainly, as 
we know—she would have received more than a fort¬ 
night ago), he must land there, at the latest, very 
early upon that morning. 

How these three days passed may be imagined by 
those who have ever been delayed, even for a few 
hours, upon a journey in which interests as dear as life 
or as awful as death were concerned. On Saturday 
they went on board the Alaska. Let those of the nearly 
two hundred saloon passengers who read these lines 
task their memories to recall the young man who, in 
spite of his efforts at self-control, betrayed the pro¬ 
found anxiety with which he noted every unfavor¬ 
able change in the weather, and the beautiful though 
singular-looking old lady who, true to her innate 
qualifications as a traveller, made her appearance 
regularly upon deck with as much fortitude and en¬ 
durance as the hardiest of the male passengers. The 
Alaska anchored outside of Sandy Hook on Sunday, 
March nth, near midnight, in the teeth of a worse 


373 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


storm than she had ever encountered there before. 
The air was too thick with sleet and snow for objects 
to be distinguished that were only twenty feet dis¬ 
tant. Including the six or seven hundred steerage 
passengers, there were nearly nine hundred souls on 
board, all anxious to get on shore, most of them suf¬ 
fering with terror at the fury of the tempest, yet * 
all compelled to endure it, with such fortitude 
as they could muster, until Tuesday morning ar¬ 
rived. A very heavy gale from the north-northwest 
had set in, with continuous thick snow. In short, 
the blizzard of March 12, 1888, had announced 
itself. Amid the numerous calamities it created, was 
the torture of Marmaduke Allan, who, imprisoned for 
two days outside the port he was so anxious to 
reach, was much more near insanity than when Dr. 
Billington’s words had hung over him with all the 
awful weight that the young man’s belief in them 
supplied. 

The prevailing features of the Great Blizzard are 
so fresh in the memory of everybody in or near New 
York at the time, that in referring to them there is 
little need to appeal to the imagination. The whole 
city and the surrounding suburbs and provinces were 
paralyzed. People who lived uptown could not get 
down, or, getting down, could not return excepting at 
the risk of life or limb. It seemed as though all 
space were emptying an infinity of frozen feathers 
upon New York. People were discovered dead, bur¬ 
ied beneath avalanches of snow. Upon Monday 
neither the surface cars nor the Elevated trains ran. 
All those railway lines which had their headquarters 
in New York or Jersey City were snowed up, trains 


HOPES AND FEARS. 


379 


were delayed, and transit made impossible. Cabs 
and carriages were scarcely procurable at any price. 
Telegraph and telephone communication was inter¬ 
rupted, and the metropolis was isolated from all the 
rest of the world. There was no gas at night from 
one end of Broadway to the other. Pedestrians be¬ 
came lost in such crowded centres as Union Square 
and Madison Square, and were assassinated by the 
storm in sight of their own houses. Theatres were 
closed. Hotels were so overcrowded that every spare 
foot was utilized, and thousands of applicants were 
turned away. A dead and ominous silence fell over 
the city. It suggested beleaguered Paris during the 
Franco-Prussian war. Provisions failed, and there 
was a dread of impending famine. Terror, conster¬ 
nation, suspense were universal. It was in this con¬ 
dition of things that Madam Gregory and Marma- 
duke, after having been detained all these wearisome 
hours at Sandy Hook, disembarked from the Alaska 
on Tuesday, March 13th. 

Long after the blizzard was over people continued 
to speak of it as though no other phenomenon equally 
terrible had happened since the beginning of the 
world. Yet only the slightest skimming through his¬ 
tory would have reminded them that this was merely 
one of innumerable episodes in the life of Nature, 
wherein she reveals her merciless and appalling 
power. The shallowest searching of records would 
have informed those who sought to be intelligent 
that once on a time, in Rome, the plague killed ten 
thousand between dawn and dawn; that eight hun¬ 
dred years ago, in Merrie England, the frost broke 
out on a midsummer day and destroyed all flower 



38 o 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


and fruit; that an accidental fire burned Chicago to 
a cinder ; and that an earthquake at Lisbon in a few 
minutes cost fifty thousand lives. The merest glance 
through history tells us of famines that lasted years, 
and provoked new and ghastly crimes ; that in Italy, 
fourteen centuries ago, parents ate their children for 
lack of bread; that once, among the mountains of 
Rudel and Tydel, a snow-storm slew seven thousand 
Swedes in their march to Drontheim; that when Ed¬ 
ward III. was within two leagues of Chartres, a tem¬ 
pest of hailstones and lightning smote to death one 
thousand of his best troops and six thousand of his 
horsemen; to say nothing of those recent floods, 
famines, and earthquakes in Asia and the islands of 
the Pacific, in which hundreds of thousands have 
been swept in agony to their last account. Verily, 
dreadful as our blizzard was, it was a trifle compared 
with the warfare of Nature at her worst. 

It was enough, however, to awake in Marmaduke 
more sickening anxiety than any he had yet experi¬ 
enced. The very elements appeared to conspire 
against him, to render it certain he should not reach 
Beatrice until after the appointed hour for the mar¬ 
riage should have expired. What should he do ? 
Where should he go ? In a few moments after land¬ 
ing he heard the dreadful news that few of the ordi¬ 
nary ways of getting uptown were practicable, and 
.that every hotel downtown was full to repletion. 
Had he been alone, he would not have hesitated a 
moment. He would instantly have begun the walk 
of Broadway—an attempt which, upon that day and 
the day previous, had been made with tragical result 
by more than one person. But now, as matters 


HOPES AND FEARS. 381 

stood, he had his aunt to dispose of, to say nothing 
of Madam Gregory’s maid. 

While he was casting about as to what he should 
do, desperately aware that the precious moments 
were quickly flying, a voice that sounded very famil¬ 
iar fell upon his ear. The words were not impressive 
in themselves, and could not be said to have any 
plainly perceived pertinency to anything whatever. 
They issued from a well-dressed woman who stood 
upon the wharf near a carriage, into which she seemed 
about to step. 

“ What’s the matter with you besides your age ?” 

Surely he had heard something like that, under 
very different circumstances, before! He looked 
again. Yes, sure enough, there was Mrs. Mincer, 
handsomely dressed, muffled luxuriously in by no 
means inexpensive furs, and looking younger than 
when he last saw her, nearly two years ago. There 
was her husband, with the same vague look in his 
brown, bulging eyes, but with an expression of calm 
happiness upon his honest face. 

“ Don’t you catch on ?” said Mrs. Mincer, still ad¬ 
dressing the contemplative Bob. “ He ain’t here. 
He didn’t come. We’ve had all our trouble for nix. 
Jump in and we’ll drive to the Elevated.” 

She tripped into the carriage as lightly as though 
her forty years were twenty. Bob followed her. The 
carriage door closed, and in another moment the 
driver would have put his horses in motion. Mar- 
maduke, with a brief apology to his aunt, darted for¬ 
ward just as Mrs. Mincer was raising the carriage- 
window, and laid his hand on the framework. 

“ Mrs. Mincer!” he cried. With Mr. Mincer he 



382 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


was not acquainted, having never even seen that gen¬ 
tleman. 

Mrs. Mincer gave one glance with her keen eyes. 
Marmaduke had greatly changed, but she recognized 
him instantly. 

“ Mr. Allan !” and she extended both her hands in 
her warm, impulsive way. 

He pressed them cordially, but was too excited to 
do more than bow absently and mechanically to Mr. 
Mincer, to whom she introduced him. 

“ You received my despatch from Bombay several 
weeks ago ?” 

“ Your despatch ? No !” 

Marmaduke’s face expressed all his feelings at this 
first failure. 

“We have moved,” explained Mrs. Mincer. “We 
are living in a flat of our own, uptown. Mr. Mincer’s 
name does not happen to be in the directory. I al¬ 
ways keep it out if possible. What did you telegraph 
about ?” 

“Miss Orme—where is she ?” 

Mrs. Mincer, of course, was fully aware that Mar¬ 
maduke and Beatrice had been betrothed, and she 
had also read all of the newspaper gossip that had 
woven itself around Marmaduke’s name. The tone 
in which he asked this question at once attracted her 
attention. 

“ Why, of course, you know that,—” she began, 
hesitatingly. 

“Yes, yes. I saw the paper. She was to be mar¬ 
ried to-day.” 

“ I sent you the paper. The date of the marriage 


HOPES AND FEARS. 3S3 

was a misprint. She was married last Sunday,—Mr. 
Allan !” 

She was frightened. He remained staring at her 
with a wild look, as though he were a spectre of the 
storm, with nothing human about him but that 
ghastly resemblance to a man. '_ 



3 8 4 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


CHAPTER XXVII. 

A KNOCK AT THE DOOR. 

Upon that dreadful Tuesday, the day after the 
blizzard, owing to the herculean exertions made, most 
of the Elevated roads were running trains consisting 
of two cars each. As it was quite impossible for car¬ 
riages to make progress up snow-choked Broadway 
excepting at the slowest rate, and at the constant 
risk of being capsized or sticking fast, the Mincers 
had engaged one simply for the purpose of being 
driven to the nearest Elevated station, whence they 
could be carried within a few feet of their residence. 

As soon as Marmaduke had recovered from the 
feeling of deathly sickness that came over him, they 
insisted that he should enter their carriage and drive 
home with them, explaining that he would find it im¬ 
possible to procure lodgment at any hotel, and very 
difficult to make his way on foot. Learning that he 
was accompanied by Madam Gregory (who, •with 
her maid, had meanwhile got into a carriage which 
Marmaduke had engaged), they still more strenuously 
insisted that the entire party should proceed at once 
to their flat, which they declared was quite large 
enough to accommodate an accession of three. As 
there was plainly nothing else to be done which of¬ 
fered half such pleasant protection to Madam Greg¬ 
ory, Marmaduke congratulated himself, amid all his 


A KNOCK AT THE DOOR. 


385 


misery, upon the unexpected asylum thus opened to 
his aunt, and accepted the hospitality in her name, 
first crossing to her to explain the situation. The 
wonderful equanimity which in former years had 
enabled her to bear with a smiling face the thousand- 
and-one discomforts to which a traveller is exposed, 
she still preserved in full force. The experience of 
her youth had acquainted her with the rigor of an 
American winter, and she had not left India without 
providing herself with all that was necessary for pro¬ 
tection in the maliciously arctic weather we are apt 
to have in the month which is satirically classed as 
the first of spring. 

Proceeding in their separate carriages, therefore, 
the two little parties slowly advanced to the nearest 
station where an Elevated train was procurable. 
Everybody who was out on that day will remember 
the almost insurmountable obstacles to local travel. 
While, therefore, our travellers are gradually nearing 
their destination, we shall take advantage of their 
numerous delays and stoppages to describe recent 
events in Mrs. Mincer’s life, meantime leaving Mar- 
maduke the victim of emotions which, even when 
contrasted with the worst that had preceded them, 
were among the bitterest in his life. 

We left Mr. and Mrs. Mincer proceeding in nervous 
expectation to the office of Mr. Gurowski, Bowling 
Green, in order to hear of something to Mrs. Mincer’s 
advantage, in accordance with a newspaper advertise¬ 
ment to that effect. The advantage was found to be 
much greater than either that lady or her husband 
had supposed. It was simply to the effect that a 
boarder who had resided with Mrs. Mincer’s mother 





3 86 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


in Philadelphia, when Jennie herself was a child, had 
died and left Mrs. Mincer not less than one hundred 
thousand dollars ! As the testator had been dead for 
some time, and a portion of the interim had been ex¬ 
pended in discovering Mrs. Mincer’s whereabouts, 
that lively little woman was not long in coming into 
possession of the money. We shall not pause here 
to dilate upon the rosiness that characterized the 
view which our two friends, whom we have seen in 
adversity, now began to take of life. No more board¬ 
ers were either taken or advertised for. Bob was 
purchased a new suit of clothes, and his watch was 
taken out of pawn. Mrs. Mincer had a chance of 
displaying that ingenuity and refined taste for which 
she was remarkable, and appeared in the cunningest 
of expensive bonnets, in which she had suggested 
improvements that astonished the milliner. Before 
their lease expired they removed to a flat much too 
large for them, the spare bedrooms in which were 
for the especial accommodation of Mrs. Mincer’s 
friends. Hence her being able to extend hospitality 
to Marmaduke, Madam Gregory, and the maid. In 
fact, this hundred thousand dollars, paltry as it is in 
the eyes of men used to handling millions, was enough 
to keep them comfortable for the rest of their life¬ 
time, and to take Mrs. Mincer to as many matinees as 
she felt inclined to attend. She provided herself with 
a good cook and an excellent housemaid, and two of 
her first purchases were a gray parrot that said “ Kiss 
Mother,” and a skye terrier whose eyes were invisible 
behind his bangs. 

Upon the Sunday evening pending the arrival of 
Marmaduke, Mrs. Mincer and her husband had taken 


A KNOCK AT THE DOOR. 


337 


a room at a downtown hotel in order to be on hand 
early on Monday for the expected arrival of the 
Alaska, on which the Spanish gentleman, Senor 
Gomez, had telegraphed her he would return. When 
he left New York he had given them his Spanish ad¬ 
dress ; and immediately upon their change of fortune 
they had communicated to him their new one. Still 
he evidently expected that she still kept a boarding¬ 
house, and had promised himself the pleasure of 
again enrolling himself among the D. B.’s. As he 
was one of her favorites, she was only too glad to 
receive him, under her changed conditions, as a 
guest as long as he chose to stay. Monday had 
brought the blizzard, but not the steamer, and the 
Mincers had found it impossible to get uptown 
again for love or money. Hence their detention 
until Tuesday morning, when they had so fortu¬ 
nately encountered the three dismayed arrivals from 
India. 

All this Mrs. Mincer recounted to her guests as 
soon as they reached the house, and had restored 
their almost frozen limbs to warmth before her genial 
grates, which, in spite of those nuisances baptized 
modern improvements wherewith the flat of the 
period teems, were found in many of the principal 
rooms. She was blest with that rare luxury, good 
servants, who, notwithstanding the unforeseen ab¬ 
sence of master and mistress, had kept everything in 
’ the condition in which it should have been had the 
heads of the house been at home—there were two 
heads, now that prosperity had descended upon 
them, and Bob, though occasionally squelched, had 
his say in almost everything. The interruption of 





38 8 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


all telegraph lines had made it impossible for Mr. 
Mincer from the downtown hotel to communicate 
with the servants, who had necessarily been left to 
conjecture that he and his car a sposa would come 
safely home as soon as the blizzard should subside. 

“You say that you first received intelligence of 
this good fortune through the advertisement of a Mr. 
Gurowski?” asked Madam Gregory, who was sitting, 
luxuriously cushioned, in a capacious arm-chair near 
the fire, sensible to the invigoration of a cup of hot 
tea she had been sipping. She had been listening to 
the narration with great interest. “ How did Mr. 
Gurowski come to advertise ?” 

“ Through the Russian Consul, who had been 
communicated with from St. Petersburg by the heirs 
of Madam— What is that name, Bob ? I never 
could pronounce Russian names.” 

“ Madam Gregorovitch ■?” suggested Bob. 

Marmaduke was deeply absorbed in brooding upon 
the final extinction of his hopes. He did not hear. 
It is probable that he had heard very little, if any¬ 
thing, of Mrs. Mincer’s voluble revelation. He had 
not even asked where Beatrice lived, where the 
marriage had taken place, and where, in all probabil¬ 
ity, she was at that moment. Now that she was 
married, he felt the utter hopelessness of the case for 
himself and her. Of what use, now, to prove to her 
his innocence ? Reflections such as these had made 
him both deaf and dumb, or he would certainly have 
been startled at the name Gregorovitch. 

“You see,” added Mrs. Mincer, “I met the lady 
many years ago, when I was a little girl. She 


A KNOCK AT THE DOOR. 389 

boarded at my mother’s house in Walnut Street, 
above Tenth. Her name—” 

“ Her name,” interrupted Madam Gregory, bend¬ 
ing slightly forward, with a graceful wave of the 
hand, “ was at that time Madam de Bergerac. She 
was very ill. A mischievous little imp of a girl, 
about eight or ten, waited upon her, and did a host 
of little kindnesses with a skill and tenderness far 
beyond her years. The lady got well and went 
abroad. She vowed to herself that when she had an 
opportunity of making a will worth making, she 
would bequeath to Virginia Creery—that was your 
name—something worth accepting ; though why she 
should have put it off until then is one of those in¬ 
consistencies of which there are so many in queer 
human nature. Madam de Bergerac (she was a 
widow) married again—a Russian named Gregoro- 
vitch—” 

“ How do you know all this ?” exclaimed Mrs. 
Mincer, breaking in, unable longer to restrain her 
curiosity. 

“ Because I am Madam Gregory—and Madam Greg¬ 
ory is the widow of the Russian, Gregorovitch. Iam 
the sick lady who is so much indebted to little Jennie 
Creery.” 

“ Great heavens! Then we owe our fortune to 
you!” exclaimed Mrs. Mincer, throwing her arms 
around Madam Gregory in the enthusiasm of grati¬ 
tude. Then a shade, in spite of herself, stole over 
her features. The money had come to her under the 
supposition that Madam Gregory was dead. Here 
was Madam Gregory alive, and Mrs. Mincer’s short¬ 
lived splendor had come to an end. 




39° 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


Perhaps Madam Gregory intuitively perceived 
these thoughts. She touched the little woman’s hand 
caressingly and said : 

“ It is a long story. Marmaduke and I will tell it 
you another time. Many years ago, on leaving 
Russia, I secreted a will in an out-of-the-way place.” 

“Oh, yes. I heard about that will through Mr. 
Gurowski.” 

“ Then, you see, it must have been found only a 
comparatively short time ago. In that will this pro¬ 
vision was made for you. I am glad that I have 
lived to see you and your husband enjoying it. True, 
I am alive, but the money is yours. All my Russian 
possessions return to me, but I will make it my busi¬ 
ness to see that that portion of them remains where 
it is.” 

Ere Mrs. Mincer could answer, there came a gentle 
knock at the door (just outside the parlor), which 
opened into the public hall. In the confused inter¬ 
change of words incited by Madam Gregory’s reve¬ 
lation, only one of the others heard it. There must 
have been something in it which Marmaduke recog¬ 
nized, for, starting from his reverie, he strode from 
the parlor (the door of which had been left ajar), and 
opened the door at which the knock had come. 

Beatrice Orme stood before him. At sight of him 
she started back and gave a low cry. After all that 
he had vainly suffered he could endure no more. 

“ Beatrice! I am,—I am,—” 

His instinctive asseveration of his innocence re¬ 
mained unfinished as he fell unconscious at her feet. 


A RING AT THE BELL. 


391 


CHAPTER XXVIII. 

A RING AT THE BELL. 

After Mrs. Mincer had left her home on the Sun¬ 
day before the blizzard, various events occurred of 
which, as yet, she was not cognizant. Before we 
come to them, however, we must revert a little in our 
record, in order that the reader may understand how 
Marmaduke happened to encounter Beatrice at that 
critical moment. 

It is quite true that since the beginning of the 
campaign opened by Dr. Billington and George, 
some months after Marmaduke’s departure from New 
York, the wooing had sped as successfully and rapid¬ 
ly as George himself could have expected. There 
will, of course, always remain some mystery in the 
fact that a girl who loves one man will sometimes 
consent to marry another, without being compelled 
to do so by physical violence. Setting aside those 
marriages of state, when private interests require to 
be entirely ignored, perhaps the most satisfactory 
solution is to be found in those moral considerations, 
of an unselfish nature, which more frequently find 
place in the lives of women than in the lives of men. 
In the case of Beatrice it was regard for her mother 
alone that made her finally consent to this marriage, 
in which she saw provided all the luxurious ease to 
which her mother had in former years been accus- 






39 2 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


tomed, and a small portion of which she had been 
able to maintain. For herself, the charm of life was 
over. Marmaduke’s conduct was as much a mystery 
as ever. She had no answer to give to it. Hope 
died within her as the months rolled away and not 
a particle of light fell upon the motives which had 
actuated him. 

George had had nearly a year and a half at his 
disposal wherein to win his coveted prize. He had 
employed every natural gift and every art he pos¬ 
sessed, in order to confirm the good impression he 
succeeded in creating. When a young man not un¬ 
pleasing in appearance suddenly arouses himself 
from a life of selfish idleness and becomes apparently 
the possessor of all those virtues which he was sup¬ 
posed not to possess, the astonishment he creates is 
a very pleasant introducer of the approval that fol¬ 
lows. It was so with George. With Mrs. Orme, 
though he could never fill the place that had been 
left vacant by Marmaduke, he gradually became a 
very welcome visitor. It was by imperceptible de¬ 
grees that she began to look upon him as a possible 
son-in-law. Beatrice remained indifferent to him, 
willing to see him and converse with him, because for 
her to do so gave her mother pleasure. 

On the return of Mrs. Orme and her daughter to 
town, late in the autumn, they would have taken 
less expensive rooms at Mrs. Mincer’s. But good 
fortune had just captured that lady, and she was 
about to move into a flat a little further uptown—the 
same one into which Madam Gregory and Marma¬ 
duke have just been introduced. The large building 
in which this flat was situated contained, Mrs. Mincer 


A RING AT THE BELL. 


393 


incidentally informed Mrs. Orme, both large and 
small suites of rooms. A small suite, the occupants 
of which were unexpectedly called south, was to 
rent, furnished, upon moderate terms. Mrs. Orme 
and Beatrice, wearied of their experience of board¬ 
ing-house life in New York, inspected the flat, found 
it suitable, and finally moved into it a few days after 
Mr. and Mrs. Mincer had taken possession of their 
own far more capacious suite upon a higher floor. 

About a year more passed before the betrothal of 
George and Beatrice became an accomplished fact. 
It would be idle to say that the great agents in 
bringing this about were not Dr. Billington and Mrs. 
Orme ; for when two elderly people, with considera¬ 
ble social culture, much knowledge of the world, and 
a great deal of tact, interest themselves in helping 
along an affair of that kind, their combination of 
talents can usually make itself felt. Dr. Billington 
was fond of splendor and sumptuousness, and paid 
visits at the palaces of the rich whenever he felt in¬ 
clined. But on the return of Beatrice and her mother 
to town, he reduced the number of these delights, in 
order that he might the oftener make himself agree¬ 
able to those ladies, and beget in Beatrice the con¬ 
viction that he would prove a father-in-law of whom 
any right-minded young lady might approve. 

It was during the second winter of Marmaduke’s 
absence that Beatrice and George became betrothed. 
But on finally consenting to this union, Beatrice was 
guilty of no deception. Far from professing a love 
she did not feel, she frankly stated that the affection 
which had once filled her heart was incapable of 
being transferred. She vouchsafed no explanation 


394 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


of Marmaduke’s conduct, and indeed expressly stipu¬ 
lated that that was to remain an unmentioned sub¬ 
ject. Dr. Billington, on his part, had respected the 
confidence that Marmaduke had placed in him, and 
George approached this marriage in absolute igno¬ 
rance both of the infamous means which his father 
had taken to make it possible, and the ostensible 
reasons for breaking the betrothal which Marma¬ 
duke’s consideration for Beatrice’s happiness had in¬ 
duced him to allege. Mrs. Orme herself had not 
married for love. She was a worldly-minded woman, 
in spite of her piety, and was very much alive to the 
"benefits of wealth and position. This type of mind 
is by no means uncommon. Extremes are never 
more likely to meet than when a questionable love of 
God is one of them and an unquestionable love of 
Mammon the other. She therefore did not look with 
uncomplacency upon this marriage with wealth ; and 
though she knew that Beatrice’s heart was not in¬ 
volved in it, she was ignorant of her daughter’s un¬ 
selfish and sacrificial motive. It must be owned, 
however, that Mrs. Orme had taken no pains to con¬ 
ceal her discontent with her vastly diminshed in¬ 
come. 

Finally, this marriage, which had grown from the 
merest mote of possibility until it had assumed the 
proportions of absolute certainty, was hurried for¬ 
ward in the most unexpected manner. Dr. Billing- 
ton’s health had recently been anything but good. 
Within the last few months peculiar nervous symp¬ 
toms had manifested themselves, with which he had 
been extremely familiar in the cases of hundreds of 
patients, and for which he had prescribed, with vary- 


A RING AT THE BELL. 


395 


ing success, with that cheerful complacency one 
generally feels in the contemplation of some one 
else’s misfortunes. The moment, however, that they 
became visible in himself, his knowledge of the men¬ 
tal condition they implied seemed only to exacerbate 
the symptoms. He was wise enough to know that 
he must not treat himself. He had too many pro¬ 
fessional enemies in this country to make other than 
difficult the task of choosing a physician whom he 
might consult with entire confidence. He resolved 
to proceed at once to London, in order to consult 
the highest medical authority there, where he was 
well-known and had no rivals who disliked him. 
Without mentioning the fact to anybody, he privately 
secured a berth on one of the steamers that was 
to leave New York for Liverpool on March 12th. 
Having done this, he made the thing known to 
George, and likewise his reasons for it, and urged 
that these circumstances should be used as a cogent 
pretext for somewhat hastening the marriage, the 
date of which had already been discussed. It had 
been mutually agreed from the start that the cere¬ 
mony should be strictly private, and take place in 
Mrs. Orme’s rooms. The necessity for. Dr. Billing- 
ton’s sudden voyage being made known to Mrs. 
Orme, she urged Beatrice to consent to the marriage 
on the Sunday afternoon preceding the date of the 
doctor’s embarkation. Wearied in spirit, and willing 
to purchase her mother’s happiness by a self-renunci¬ 
ation which declared to herself that all hope of happi¬ 
ness was abandoned, Beatrice consented, and arrange¬ 
ments were perfected for having the ceremony per¬ 
formed in private at that time. 


39 ^ 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


When the afternoon service at the neighboring 
church, which Mrs. Orme and Beatrice had attended 
upon withdrawing from St. Remigius, was over, the 
clergyman, the Rev. Dr. Barton, walked round to 
Mrs. Orme’s residence, and was just ascending the 
stairs which conducted to her suite as Mrs. Mincer 
and Bob were getting into the carriage they had 
hired to convey them downtown. Occasionally Mr. 
and Mrs. Mincer converted the latter part of Sunday 
into a festival, and this was one of the occasions. 
They had never gotten over a sort of childish delight 
in dining at restaurants, and that evening they were 
going to take an early dinner at the Cafe Brunswick 
previous to calling on some friends with whom they 
were under an engagement to attend a concert. The 
concert over, their final intention was to proceed to 
the downtown hotel, so as to be in plenty of time to 
meet Sefior Gomez, whose arrival upon the Alaska 
was expected in the morning. We have seen how 
their expectations in regard to the last-mentioned 
point were frustrated. They had understood Bea¬ 
trice’s marriage was to be entirely private, and were 
not surprised to see that the programme was being 
severely carried out. We may here mention, by-the- 
bye, that the reason Mrs. Mincer had not told Mar- 
maduke that Beatrice and her mother were under 
the same roof with herself, was because she knew 
that it was the only comfortable shelter he and 
Madame Gregory were likely at the time to obtain, 
and she feared Marmaduke might hesitate to avail 
himself of it if informed that he would be in danger 
of running across the woman who was irrevocably 
lost to him. It was as likely as not that such meeting 


A RING AT THE BELL. 


397 


might take place, inasmuch as it was impossible that 
the newly married pair should have left town. The 
storm had blocked all egress. Mrs. Mincer was en¬ 
tirely ignorant of Dr. Billington’s intended departure 
for Europe, and therefore would not have been able 
to impart that information to Marmaduke even had 
she wished. 

A bride more calmly serious than Beatrice was 
upon that Sunday afternoon has perhaps seldom 
been seen. An almost sepulchral gloom and silence 
seemed to have settled upon the little suite. The 
Rev. Dr. Barton, Dr. Billington, and George were in 
the parlor awaiting her entrance. Everything was 
ready for the ceremony to proceed. In a few mo¬ 
ments it would begin. It was then that Mrs. Orme 
seemed to realize, for the first time, that a gigantic 
sacrifice was being made for her. She looked at 
Beatrice with all the sad triumph of a mother who 
sees her daughter “ established ” in the eyes of the 
world, and observed that though her cheeks were 
pale, a fire burned in her eyes. Thereupon she went 
up to her, and clasping her gently in her arms, said: 

“ Beatrice, it is not too late. You are not yet mar¬ 
ried. Everything done so far can be undone. You 
are doing all this for me—for me only.” 

Beatrice would not break down at that last mo¬ 
ment. A sacrifice incomplete, a sacrifice so illy made 
that ere finished it is detected and declined, is no sac¬ 
rifice at all. At any rate so she must have thought, 
for she answered gently: 

“ I do not love George as I once dreamed I should 
love a husband. I do not love him at all. But I es¬ 
teem him. He has compelled me to do that. He 



398 THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 

will make me a kind husband. I shall make him a 
faithful wife. I will give him everything a wife can 
give, excepting—excepting—” 

“Excepting love?’' asked Mrs. Orme, in a tone 
that declared that in her estimation that was a com¬ 
parative trifle. “ O Beatrice, do you—do you still 
love—” 

She hesitated at pronouncing a name which had 
been so long unmentioned between them. Beatrice 
looked at her entreatingly, slightly compressed her 
lips, and shook her head. The shake was not a neg¬ 
ative to Mrs. Orme’s question, but simply an indica¬ 
tion that the matter must remain undiscussed, and 
so Mrs. Orme construed it. 

“ Come,” said Beatrice, “ we must go. It is getting 
late. They are waiting.” 

She drew her 'mother gently forward, and they 
traversed with noiseless steps the passage which led 
into the parlor where the ceremony was to be per¬ 
formed. In doing this it was necessary to pass the 
door which opened upon the public hall. As they 
did so there came a loud ring at that portal, which 
startled everybody in the little household. The 
blood leaped to Beatrice’s cheek. There are coinci¬ 
dences which seem to argue that occult forces are at 
work. She thought so as she opened the door. 


MRS. MINCER HAS COMPANY. 


399 


CHAPTER XXIX. 

MRS. MINCER HAS COMPANY. 

When Marmaduke awoke from his swoon, he found 
himself lying upon the sofa in Mrs. Mincer’s parlor, 
alone with some one whom to see made him sensible 
of equal portions of bliss and pain. 

“ Beatrice !” he murmured, “ Beatrice !” 

She came and knelt beside him, smoothing the hair 
back from his forehead. Oh, the ecstasy of that 
touch, reminding him of everything which is heaven 
to the sense and happiness to memory. It was Mr. 
Mincer who had lifted him and laid him upon the 
sofa. Then, when he had shown signs of recovering, 
Mrs. Mincer had stepped quietly downstairs to in¬ 
form Mrs. Orme of what had happened, and Madam 
Gregory and Bob had retired into one of the adjoin¬ 
ing rooms. 

“ Then you did not receive my telegram ?” he 
asked, thrilling beneath the beloved pressure of her 
fingers. 

“ Not until Sunday evening,” she answered. 

“ And then,” he muttered, with a deep groan, “ it 
was too late!” 

“ No.” 

He started up. For an instant it seemed as though 
consciousness would again leave him. Though seated, 
he reeled as one does in vertigo. 





4oo 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


“ You are not married ?” 

“ No. The moment before the ceremony was to 
have taken place, a loud ring came at our bell. We 
live upon the floor below. I was passing the door. 
I opened it. A telegraph messenger handed me a 
despatch. It was yours.” 

“ Beatrice !” 

He caught her in his arms. This late salvation 
was so sweet that he held her tight in that embrace, 
without another spoken word, until several moments 
had elapsed. Then came a sound, a terrible sound, 
the breaking up, in an instant, of the prolonged and 
hideous misery he had endured. She felt his breast 
heave and all his frame shake as he held her closely 
in his quivering arms, while those great convulsive 
sobs which break forth in spite of strongest effort, 
and announce the approach or departure of a sorrow 
worse than death, broke against her heart as they 
left his. 

“ Marmaduke !” 

She could say no more in the extremity of her love 
and terror. She sat upon his lap and passed her 
arms around his head, pressing it against her face 
and stroking it ever so gently, as her tears mingled 
with his own. 

“ I love you ! I love you !” he exclaimed, conquer¬ 
ing himself by a mighty effort. “ And you ?” 

“ I have always loved you,” she replied, with chok¬ 
ing voice. “ I have always loved you through it all.” 

Long and silent, except for inarticulate murmurs, 
was the embrace that followed, in which kisses 
stopped the course of tears, and tears fell, as with a 
fresh baptism, upon sacred and rapturous kisses. 


MRS. MINCER HAS COMPANY. 


4<3I 


Those moments were as full of ecstasy as mortals are 
allqwed to know. Perhaps they resembled that in¬ 
stant of reunion when spirits who have suffered upon 
earth, meet again, freed from the body’s thraldom, 
and begin a life where none of the anguish that 
belongs to flesh and blood can enter. 

Protracted was the conversation that followed. It 
remained uninterrupted to the end. He gave her the 
history of the infamous deception that had been 
practised upon him, and all the details accompanying 
his discovery of it, with which the reader is familiar. 
His narrative ended, Beatrice related the gradual 
steps by which she had been led to entertain the pos¬ 
sibility of her marriage with George, pausing for a 
moment from agitation when she arrived at the point 
where she had received Marmaduke’s telegram on 
that fateful Sunday. 

“ And why did you not receive it before ?” asked 
Marmaduke, mentioning the names of the persons to 
whose care he had addressed the other two. Bea¬ 
trice explained that she and her mother no longer at¬ 
tended St. Remigius ; that the pastor was travelling; 
and that Marmaduke’s business agent had recently 
died, as Mrs. Orme had observed in her perusal of 
the obituary column in the morning paper. 

“ But by what means did you happen to receive 
this one on Sunday afternoon ?” asked Marmaduke. 
“ You ought to have got it a month ago.” 

“ It was to ask Mr. Mincer that question that I 
knocked at the door when you opened it. When the 
boy handed me the telegram, he explained that sev¬ 
eral weeks ago it had reached the office near which 
we used to reside when we boarded with Mrs. Min- 





402 


THE LADY OF CAWNFORE. 


cer. He added that, not knowing our present ad¬ 
dress, and being unable to find us, the despatch had 
been sent back to the main office. That was all he 
knew. I thought that Mr. Mincer might be able to 
throw light on the mattei*, and it was for that reason 
I went up to their flat as soon as I supposed they 
had returned. I had made more than one inquiry for 
them during the day.” 

They were left for the present in mystery on this 
point, but subsequently learned that on the preced¬ 
ing Saturday Mr. Mincer had stopped at the tele¬ 
graph office which was near his former residence, in 
order to send some business despatch ; that the clerk 
who took the message recognized Mr. Mincer’s name, 
and with unusual intelligence and memory called to 
mind the telegram from India to Miss Orme ; and 
the fact that Mrs. Orme’s address had formerly been 
identical with Mrs. Mincer’s. The clerk had there¬ 
fore inquired Miss Orme’s present address, and upon 
being informed, had promised to look up the missing 
despatch,without mentioning, however, whence it had 
come. Bob, with his characteristic carelessness, had 
omitted to narrate the circumstance to Beatrice. 
But the telegraph clerk had meanwhile made the 
necessary inquiries, and the result was the delivery 
of the despatch on Sunday. 

“ But what happened,” asked Marmaduke, who had 
listened with patience up to the instant at which the 
despatch had been received, “ what happened after 
you read my message?” 

“For a moment,” responded Beatrice, “ I was so 
amazed that I said nothing; amazed, not at the con¬ 
tents of the telegram, for they only hinted at some- 


MRS. MINCER HAS COMPANY. 403 

thing which I had often vaguely suspected, but 
amazed that some such intelligence had not reached 
me sooner.” 

“ Remember, darling, that I telegraphed you the 
first moment it was possible after having met my 
aunt and learned the truth from her.” 

“Yes, I understand that now. As soon as I re¬ 
covered from my amazement, and had sent away the 
messenger, my resolution was taken. Of course I 
could not suspect even then what the truth was. I 
was merely corroborated in my long-cherished con¬ 
viction that some explanation existed. I felt sorry 
for George, for it was certain—it is certain that he 
loves me. But he knew up to the last moment that I 
had nothing but esteem and fidelity to give him in 
return. Dr. Billington, overhearing my words with 
the messenger, had stepped to the parlor door. I 
shall never forget the expression of his face when he 
caught the word “ Bombay ” and inferred that the 
despatch had come from you. I had not the remotest 
idea at the time of what that expression meant ; but 
I saw that he had received a dreadful blow, much 
severer than the circumstances, as I then knew them, 
seemed to warrant. My mother, to whom I had 
shown the telegram excused us to Dr. Barton. We 
were obliged to leave him alone for a little time while 
we were conferring in an adjoining room. Then I 
simply handed George your despatch, and said to his 
father, ‘ This marriage cannot go on.’ He put his 
hands up to his head and uttered a sort of cry, but 
at that moment had his attention attracted to George, 
who had turned deadly pale and had sunk into the 
nearest chair. But I must say that, considering 




404 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


what a spoiled child George had been all his life, he 
behaved very well. He gave really a magnificent 
example of self-control, and pointing to the telegram 
as he passed it to his father, said to me, ‘ Do you 
mean to abide by that ?’ I said—but I am sure my 
tone must have shown how much I felt for him—‘ I 
mean to abide by that. I have felt from time to time, 
from the first, that there was some terrible explana¬ 
tion of all this misery which might not come to light 
during Marmaduke’s lifetime, but which, if I knew it, 
would make the matter clear.’ ‘ But if the explana¬ 
tion should not meet the case,’ he asked, ‘will you then 
promise to be my wife ?’ ‘ George,’ I answered, ‘ have 

you any love or esteem left for a woman who could 
deliberately promise a man her hand up to the mo¬ 
ment of marriage, and then recede with no more satis¬ 
factory reason than what, from the very nature of the 
case, this telegram can be to you ?’ I won’t tell you 
exactly what he said in reply, Marmadulce. What he 
did say showed that his love was unalterable. While 
he was making his reply we were all startled by Dr. 
Billington’s voice. He had been staring at the de¬ 
spatch, apparently reading it over and over again. 
Finally he said, in a voice so weak and hoarse that 
we would scarcely have recognized it, * It’s all up, 
George. She will never marry you now.’ We stared 
at him—George most of all—wondering what he could 
mean. His face grew ashen-colored. His hands 
trembled. He seized hold of George’s arm and 
begged to be taken home. He wanted, if possible, to 
reach the steamer that night in order to sail early 
Monday morning.” 

“ Has the wretch, then, sailed ? Has he escaped 


MRS. MINCER HAS COMPANY. 405 

me ?” asked Marmaduke, all his subsided fury re¬ 
turning in a tidal-wave, and his features reddening 
with passion. 

“ No.” 

“ Thank God !” exclaimed Marmaduke in the same 
ireful tones. 

** No ship left the port on Monday,” resumed 
Beatrice. “ The storm was too violent. The doctor 
was compelled to postpone his departure. He sails 
on the Nevada to-morrow.” 

“I shall yet have time,” muttered Marmaduke, 
grating his teeth. 

“ George looked at me,” continued Beatrice, taking 
up the thread of her narrative, “ and reached out his 
hand. He said only one word—* good-bye.’ But he 
said it so heart-brokenly, and he looked so wretched, 
that his countenance grew almost noble. I took his 
hand and repeated his word—‘good-bye.’ He put 
his arm within his father’s, who was almost tottering, 
and without another word both went away, never 
once looking back. I have not seen them since. My 
mother went in to Dr. Barton and informed him, in 
general terms, that the marriage had been indefi¬ 
nitely postponed. Dr. Barton went away. All was 
over.” 

Need we dwell upon what followed ? Presently 
there came a gentle tap at the door, and Madam 
Gregory entered. She was longing to see the young 
people in their happiness, after having seen one of 
them in his deep distress. Her tender and graceful 
manner, behind which was such a world of painful 
recollection, impressed Beatrice greatly, and the 
free-masonry of gentle birth and kindly feeling 




406 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


drew them together instantly, almost as much as the 
misery in which they had respectively been involved. 
Then, Mrs. Mincer returning from her expedition to 
Mrs. Orme, who had at first been overcome by the 
intelligence, Beatrice conducted Madam Gregory 
and Marmaduke to her mother, who, she knew, 
would be only too impatient to embrace the nephew 
and welcome the aunt. 

They found Mrs. Orme in a flutter of joy and 
tears—almost hysterical, in fact—with a sense of the 
sorrow that had passed away and the happiness that 
was in store. She was prepared to greet Marma¬ 
duke with all her old feelings of affection v and 
nearly all her ancient veneration, for she regarded 
him as merely a wanderer from the fold, who would 
ultimately return to it. She had apparently forgot¬ 
ten that his riches would vanish with his marriage ; 
or if she had not, possibly it was because of the 
enormous wealth which she had heard Mrs. Mincer 
ascribe to the aunt. The details of Marmaduke’s 
history were reserved for Mrs. Orme’s ear until a later 
hour. She was quite satisfied, meanwhile, to see her 
daughter happy, and to feel again that glow in her 
heart which had been absent ever since the estrange¬ 
ment between Beatrice and Marmaduke began. 

“ And is it possible that you are Madam Gregory ?” 
she exclaimed, taking both that lady’s hands in her 
own, and peering, with tender regard, into her face. 
“ How often have I heard my husband speak of you ! 
He met you when you were quite a girl. He thought 
you the most beautiful one he had ever seen. You 
lived opposite us in Philadelphia, on Walnut above 
Tenth.” 


MRS. MINCER HAS COMPANY. 


407 


“ In a large boarding-house kept by Mrs. Mincer’s 
mother,” said Madam Gregory, with a very tender 
smile, thinking of the happiness of the queer little 
couple in the flat above, upon whom so small a thing 
as one hundred thousand dollars had conferred such 
joy. 

“ Ah, yes. The house was owned by Commodore 

-” And here Mrs. Orme went off into a ramified 

specification of genealogies, in which she generally 
indulged whenever a Philadelphia notability was 
mentioned. In the midst of it she was interrupted 
by a message from Mrs. Mincer, saying that dinner 
had been prepared for all of them, and would they 
come up and partake ? 

There was no sense in declining such an invitation 
as that ; and accordingly, a few moments found 
them seated at Mrs. Mincer’s hospitable board, that 
little woman’s eyes looking ready to burst with de¬ 
light at the joyous intelligence, of which she had 
caught the first inkling from Mrs. Orme, and of 
which she was content to learn the rest, or as much 
as the parties concerned chose to tell, as soon as the 
dinner, whereon her cook had concentrated consider¬ 
able skill, was disposed of. In the interim it was 
enough for Mrs. Mincer, with a heart as large as 
heaven, to know that everybody was happy, herself 
included. While the servant had gone to give her 
invitation, she had told Bob she had never had any 
doubt that Dr. Billington was a “ regular fake,” and 
that the engagement between George and Beatrice 
was a “put-up job;” adding that the moment she 
saw Marmaduke and Miss Orme meet in the hall, she 
knew they would come together again, and was “on 



408 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


to it” instantly. Bob did the carving as dexterously 
as in the olden days, when the D. B.’s were a dismal 
fact, and looked as though he had been accustomed 
to have a princess at his table*all his life. Madam 
Gregory behaved with that cordial simplicity, which 
was her most powerful charm, in the strange position 
wherein she found herself. If Marmaduke and 
Beatrice failed to appreciate perfectly the viands 
Mrs. Mincer’s larder provided, the fault must be 
accounted for by the fact that exultant joy, after so 
prolonged and terrible an ordeal, leaves the soul 
incapable, for a time, of attending to the needs of 
the body. Mrs. Orme was beaming with joy and 
what she would have called “ proper pride.” The 
joy proceeded from the circumstance that Beatrice’s 
future happiness was assured, and that Marmaduke 
was now known to be worthy of confidence and love. 
The pride was caused by the consciousness that, in 
sitting beside Madam Gregory, she was again in 
“ her own circlefor was not Madam Gregory, 
though she preferred only to be known by that title, 
the widow of both a Russian and an Indian prince, 
and were not her possessions fabulously large ? 

Meanwhile the Hindoo maid, exposed for the first 
time to the rigors of our dreadful winter, had been 
given a seat by the hottest fire in the house, and, 
warmed into comfort beside the kitchen range, was 
eating the simple food which her religion and the 
custom of her native land prescribed. She had pre¬ 
pared it with her own hands, vrondering meanwhile 
at the heathen ways of Christians, and contrasting 
them, greatly to their disparagement, with the ex- 


MRS. MINCER HAS COMPANY. 409 

alted and refined methods laid down for the disciples 
of Siva. 

After dinner—time had passed rapidly and it was 
about nine o’clock—Marmaduke drew Beatrice aside 
and said something to her in a low voice. Her an¬ 
swer was a question. 

“ But must you go to-night?” she said. 

“If I do not, he will be gone. You told me he 
sailed in the Nevada to-morrow morning. But I shall 
hurry back. The evening must not end without my 
seeing you again.” 

“ But you will say—you will do nothing rash ?” 

“ Never fear. But I have that to say to him which 
he must remember as long as life shall last.” 

He bade her farewell for a little while, excused 
himself to the rest, and then leaving the house, made 
his way as rapidly as the narrow pathways and the 
huge piles of snow would permit, toward the resi¬ 
dence of Dr, Billington, 




4 io 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


CHAPTER XXX. 

“ VENGEANCE IS MINE.” 

It was not easy to make one’s way on foot on such 
a night as that. But Marmaduke was young and 
strong, and in about three-quarters of an hour he 
reached the doctor’s house. He rang the bell, and in 
a moment an old man-servant, who had been em¬ 
ployed there for years, opened the door. He recog¬ 
nized Marmaduke, but with the imperturbability of 
long training and experience, permitted only a gleam 
of respectful remembrance, until Marmaduke ex¬ 
tended his hand with his characteristic cordiality- 
Even now, in answer to the visitor's inquiry whether 
Dr. Billington was at home, he answered according 
to time-honored custom, “ I will see, sir,” and left 
him alone for a few moments in the dimly lit parlor. 
Presently he returned, and saying, “Come this way, 
sir, if you please,” led Marmaduke to- the study. 
Opening the door of this, he admitted him, and clos¬ 
ing it, left him alone with its occupant. 

During the time it had taken Marmaduke to reach 
that house, the deep indignation which had been ex¬ 
cited when he first learned from his auDt of Dr. Bil- 
lington’s villainy, had flamed up in its pristine 
strength. Under the fluctuations of hope and despair 
that had marked his journey from Bombay, he had 
frequently lost sight of it. It had dwindled into 


“vengeance is mine.” 411 

nothingness, for the moment, in the rapture of his 
reunion with Beatrice. But now, his future happi¬ 
ness settled so far as she was concerned, his fury re¬ 
awakened at the remembrance of the joy he had 
missed, the suffering he had experienced, and the 
lifetime of anguish from which only an accident had 
saved him. He had come hither to-night, prepared 
to say or do he scarcely knew what. It was absurd 
to think of demanding any kind of personal satisfac¬ 
tion from a man of Dr. Billington’s years. He had 
reflected that he had much to avenge, but how was 
he to avenge it ? He was convinced that George was 
entirely innocent of any complicity, and his sense of 
justice revolted at the idea of even harboring a wish 
to visit upon the son the iniquity of the father. He 
could have no quarrel with George. On the contrary, 
he felt for him a deep compassion. Had he wished 
for so poor a thing as legal indemnity, this was a 
case unprovided for in law. Dr. Billington had 
merely lied. He had simply stated that a letter 
which he knew to be written by one person was 
written by another. He had not forged a name, or 
altered a date, or added or subtracted a word. He 
had only been guilty of a hideous deception. Where, 
then, could punishment find entrance? 

These thoughts danced in a complicated throng 
through Marmaduke’s brain as the door closed be¬ 
hind him, and he found himself confronted with the 
solitary figure at the desk. The back of the high 
carved chair at first concealed it, but as Marmaduke 
stepped forward he saw that it was not Dr. Billing¬ 
ton, but George. 

“ Your father—where is he ?” asked Marmaduke. 




412 


THE LADY OF CAVVNPORE. 


Neither of the young men had made a gesture of 
recognition or welcome. 

“ Gone.” 

“Gone? Where?” 

“ It is now ten o’clock. He left here this afternoon 
with his valet in order to pass the night on board the 
steamer. Where are you going ?” 

George had started up with detaining gesture, for 
Marmaduke had already reached the door. 

“ To find him.” 

“ Impossible.” 

“ We shall see.” 

He flung himself out of the room — that room 
whence he had rushed so despairingly nearly two 
years ago—when he felt George clutch him by the 
arm. He was about to disengage himself violently, 
when his glance fell on the young man’s white face, 
and he recognized there a suffering similar to what 
had so recently been his own. While he paused with 
deepened compassion, George said: 

“ It will take you hours to reach the ship, and at 
this time, with the roads blocked, no surface cars, and 
the elevated trains irregular, I doubt whether you 
could get there. The steamer sails at a very early 
hour in the morning. For you to reach the steamer 
now is almost hopeless ; and even if you did, there 
would be but few moments for what you have to 
say.” 

“ I will risk that.” 

And with a wrench of his powerful arm he loosed 
himself, and strode once more toward the front door. 

“ Marmaduke !” 

Marmaduke stopped at that pleading cry, it was 


“vengeance is mine.” 413 

so unlike any he had ever heard from George’s lips. 
That George should ever suffer and let his suffering 
be seen; that he should ever entreat of anybody a 
favor that had been at first refused, were things so 
new and strange that he stopped instinctively and 
retraced his steps. 

“ Hear what I have to say,” said George in a husky 
voice. “ Then go, if you will.” 

They re-entered the study. George sat in his 
father’s chair, Marmaduke in the low chair near. 

“ My father,” said George, striving to master his 
voice, “ left here so early, partly on account of the 
difficulty of getting downtown, partly to make sure 
of avoiding you. You do not know that during the 
last few months he has betrayed signs of incipient 
paralysis. Trivial as they may seem, they may soon 
prove fatal unless he can get unexpected relief abroad. 
His valet, who has been in his employment for years 
and is a faithful man, goes with him. I shall follow in 
another week. My father’s intellect is already weak¬ 
ened. I perceived it in the confession he made to 
me.” 

“ Confession ?” 

“He told me everything. I forced him to it last 
Sunday evening when we returned from Mrs. Orme’s. 
He was for leaving the house at once to go on board 
the ship. I would not permit it until I had learned 
the truth. Afterwards the storm set in, and the vessel 
did not sail. He sat where I sit now. I sat there 
where you are. Both of us had read the telegram 
you sent to Beatrice. When my father first read it 
he turned to me and said, ‘ It’s all up. She will not 
marry you now.’ Something in his voice aroused a 



414 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


suspicion of—I do not know what. I felt sure some 
terrible villainy—yes, villainy—had been perpetrated. 
After we got home I almost dragged him into this 
room. He tried to avoid it, but I made him come. 
Then he told me bit by bit—I believe I fright¬ 
ened him into it—all this horrible transaction. You 
know it ?’’ 

Marmaduke nodded, gazing with compassion upon 
the wasted face before him—wasted in forty-eight 
short hours. 

“ You had an aunt—” began George. 

“ I have found her. I have brought her with me. 
No link in the chain is lacking. I know the whole 
history from end to end. I know that you are en¬ 
tirely without blame. Let us be friends. I must be 
going.” 

He rose, extending his hand. 

“ No ! No !” exclaimed George, in the same plead¬ 
ing voice, clasping Marmaduke’s hands in both his 
own. “ I know what you are going for. You are 
going to see my father. Is it not so ?” 

Marmaduke bowed his head in response. 

“ Give up that idea,” pleaded George, in a manner 
so totally changed from his wont that Marmaduke 
saw that he had become a different being. “ If you 
want vengeance—” 

“ What vengeance can I take,” asked Marmaduke, 
bitterly. “I cannot kill him. ’Twould be poor ven¬ 
geance if I did. I can only speak a few poor weak 
words for his remembrance that are burning in my 
brain.” 

“ Leave them unspoken. Leave him to God.” 

“ God ?” 


“vengeance is mine.” 415 

Marmaduke stared at this fashionable young man, 
a cynic of the clubs, a sybarite of drawing-rooms. 

“ Leave him to God ?” he asked. “ Do you believe 
in God ?” 

“ Yes,” replied George, fire gleaming through the 
moisture of his eyes. “ Some are led to believe in 
Him through happiness ; I am being led to believe 
in Him through suffering. I see how He can punish. 
Marmaduke, the punishment of my father has begun. 
He fears you. He dreads you ; I believe he would 
have fled the country, even had he not designed to do 
so, as soon as possible after reading your despatch. 
He counted confidently upon the death of Madam 
Gregory. He calculated upon never being found out. 
And I feel certain in my own mind that the con¬ 
sciousness of his guilt has been the chief cause in 
bringing on these obscure paralytic symptoms. He 
is dying. He will die soon, unless, instead, he sinks 
into hopeless insensibility. Be generous. You can 
afford to be so. Do not increase his sufferings by 
those words which you say are now burning within 
you, however much you may have the right. Promise 
me that, and I will make you a promise that will be 
the hardest and bitterest to keep of all that I have 
ever made.” 

“And what is that?” 

“ Make me that promise and I will promise in turn 
that I will sincerely wish your happiness and—and 
hers—” 

His voice trembled. He endeavored to smile, but 
the attempt was an heroic failure. Marmaduke was 
deeply touched. 

** I promise,” he said, taking the proffered hand. 



416 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


“Then we remain friends?” 
“ Yes.” 

“ Good-bye.” 


Dr. Billington had indeed passed beyond the juris¬ 
diction of man and entered that which solely belongs 
to God. Ere the year was concluded he died in 
London in a private asylum, in which it had been 
necessary to have him placed. Up to the present 
date George has not married ; but the comparative 
seriousness of his life in the large and lonely house 
which has become a portion of his inheritance gives 
no positive assurance either that he will or will not 
remain a bachelor. 

Beatrice and Marmaduke were married within a 
month after the latter’s return to New York. Before 
the wedding took place, however, Madam Gregory 
had a long private interview with her nephew, in 
which she asserted her intention of making him the 
immediate possessor of a very comfortable fortune, 
which she could readily spare out of the immense 
possessions she enjoyed as widow of both Prince 
Gregorovitch and Prince Fazal. It was useless for 
Marmaduke to resist the gift. Madam Gregory had 
had little in the latter half of her life to make her 
happy, and it was yielding her only the indemnity 
she entreated by permitting her thus to repair the 
gross injustice of her brother’s will. Her return, in 
company with Marmaduke, to this country, had not 
been necessary as matters had turned out; but she 
did not regret it, for it enabled her to become inti¬ 
mately acquainted with Beatrice and Mrs. Orme, 


VENGEANCE IS MINE.” 


417 


and to renew a few friendships which her strange 
■experience had interrupted for a generation. Apart 
from these advantages, her revisitation of America 
was one .of those apparently superfluous episodes 
which often occur in human life, where a certain end 
is attained by means altogether different from those 
elaborately designed. 

Mr. and Mrs. Mincer continued to enjoy life in 
their handsome flat. Madam Gregory’s existence 
did not interfere with the bequest, that lady immedi¬ 
ately taking the necessary legal means for arranging 
the matter. Bob was as fond of playing upon his 
Stradivari us as ever. He took no more pupils, and 
his favorite strain became “ Ah ! non giunge,” in¬ 
stead of “ The Sweet Bye and Bye.” 

Whatever regrets Mrs. Orme might have had for 
the loss of wealth so great as Marmaduke’s had been, 
—it reverted to those charitable channels specified in 
Mr. Joseph Allan’s will,—they were considerably 
lessened by the magnificent provision made for him 
by his aunt. As June approached, Madam Gregory 
expressed a desire to visit St. Petersburg, there to 
look after her inheritance, first having communi¬ 
cated with Prince Gregorovitch’s family through the 
Russian -consul. In this journey she was accom¬ 
panied, at her earnest entreaty, by Marmaduke and 
Beatrice, as well as by Mrs. Orme. It is hardly 
necessary to state that the latter lady read with the 
utmost complacency the announcement of their trip 
in the fashionable intelligence. 

As it would be necessary for Madam Gregory to 
remain some little time in Russia, Mrs. Orme con¬ 
sented to become her guest there, while Beatrice and 



418 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


Marmaduke proceeded to India. Marmaduke had 
reasons which he had not mentioned for wishing to 
go on before them alone with his wife. The palace 
at Benares still remained upon his hands. During 
his absence it had been closed. A letter to Saja Su- 
jeetra ensured its being open and everything in 
working order by the time he and his wife arrived. 
At the railway station they were met by Sujeetra and 
Mr. Loveridge, both of whom were delighted to see 
Marmaduke under conditions that contrasted so bliss¬ 
fully with those in which they had last seen him. 
Both became devoted friends of Beatrice, as they 
already were of her husband, and a few months after, 
when Madam Gregory and Mrs. Orme arrived, the 
party of six spent many a happy day on the shaded 
portico opening upon the garden. 

In the midst of all this joy a shadow trembled in 
Marmaduke’s breast. One morning—one of the lov- 
liest, perhaps, that India had ever seen—he went to 
his wife and asked her to visit with him a portion of 
the palace which since their arrival had remained 
unopened. She smilingly consented. Upon that 
particular morning no one was in the palace except¬ 
ing the servants and themselves. He led her through 
several passages until he stopped before a door, 
which he unlocked with a key he carried. Asking 
her to pause for a moment, he entered first, and by 
the removal of a bolt here and a bar there allowed 
the sunlight and the breeze to freshen the odor of 
the long vacated room. Then he invited Beatrice 
to enter, and closing the door they stood there alone. 

He looked slowly around. A sweet sorrow stole 
gently over him. It touched exquisitely the finest 


“vengeance is mine.” 419 

chords of his spirit. There were the books which 
Adwe had loved. There was the piano on which she 
had learned rudely to play. The accents of her 
childlike voice seemed to float upon the luxurious 
air. 

“ Dearest, what is it ?” asked Beatrice, stealing up 
to him, and gazing at him with eyes which her love 
for him alone would have made beautiful had they 
had no beauty of their own. 

“ Darling, there is a passage in my life of which I 
have never told you. But I must tell you now. Sit 
down.” 

She sat down upon the couch where Adwe had once 
sat. He had thought of all that; and she who was 
now dead was so innocent and beautiful in his eyes, 
his memory of her so reverent and sacred, that kneel¬ 
ing beside his wife, holding her hands in his, he told 
the story from the beginning up to the hour when 
he had baptized the parting spirit, arranged the 
cross upon the pulseless bosom, lighted the awaiting 
pyre, gathered the poor pale ashes, and lowered the 
vase that had contained them into the midnight 
stream. 

As he concluded, Beatrice was weeping violently. 

“ Beatrice, do you love me?” 

“ Marmaduke !” She gathered him up to her em¬ 
brace and kissed him with passionate ardor. “ I 
love you ! I love you ! You have led two souls to 
the heaven you reject. Will you not let me lead 
you ? ” 

“ Dearest,” he answered, “ lead me back to that 
heaven if you can. I will try to follow. Whatever 
religion a man may have, faith is a factor in them 


420 


THE LADY OF CAWNPORE. 


all. This very morning I wrote a poem which re¬ 
minded me of you and of our relations to each 
other.” 

“ What was it ?” 

“ Listen. It is entitled ‘ To a Woman.’” 

And still kneeling before her, and holding her 
hands, he said softly : 

Because your forehead wears the crown of peace ; 

Because your thoughts are chaste as cherished flowers ; 
Because your spirit grows, through prayerful hours, 

From strength to strength with holiest increase; 

Because you humbly serve, nor ask release, 

Gliding serene, through sunshine and through showers. 
Seeing, in light that smiles, in cloud that lowers, 

The one eternal love that cannot cease : 

I sometimes think diviner lives than this 
Await alike the souls that triumph here 
And those that rest in shame beneath the sod. 

Yea, when I dream of compensating bliss, 

’Tis but because your life, that hovers near, 

Speaks, in its quietude, of heaven and God. 


THE END. 


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